Good Morning,
Halloween is this Saturday night and the signs of the occasion are everywhere. There is little you cannot find to celebrate the occasion from candies and treats for the “Trick or Treaters”, decorations indicative of the holiday, to costumes that fulfill your esoteric need to express your alter ego without being considered completely “mental” or acting the fool. Actually when I think about it, once a year may be just enough to placate that need and for some could be a excellent fill-in between Star Trek and Star Wars conventions and the like.
According to Wikipedia, (one of my very favorite sources) “Halloween has origins in the ancient Gaelic festival known as Samhain, which is derived from Old Irish and means roughly “summer’s end”.
“The celebration has some elements of a festival of the dead. The ancient Gaels believed that the border between this world and the Otherworldbecame thin on Samhain, allowing spirits (both harmless and harmful) to pass through. The family’s ancestors were honoured and invited home whilst harmful spirits were warded off. It is believed that the need to ward off harmful spirits led to the wearing of costumes and masks. Their purpose was to disguise oneself as a harmful spirit and thus avoid harm.”That and a plethora of other information about Halloween is available on the web, if you want to spend the time.
I have discovered that there are few that are actually ambivalent about the holiday and are either “for it” or “want nothing to do with it”. I suppose that as we get older and our understanding of such holidays deepen, it can become difficult to retain or maintain the innocence we had as a child and just enjoy the moment. I suspect it is kind of like what has happened to Santa Claus and The Easter Bunny. In creeps that ol’ Adultitusthing again. I think some of this disdain with Halloween would be that seeing all of the Ghost, Goblins, and Skeletons running around may be unsettling for some by reminding us that there “may just be” a “spiritual world” of the secular. After all, we tend to fear things we do not understand.
At this stage of the game (game of life), I believe I will choose to enjoy this moment and not let my age interfere with “letting the kid out” just one more time. So this year, I will figure out a costume to wear, not too extreme, carve a pumpkin into a Jack-O-Lantern with my very best effort and then enjoy this moment with the ones who’s innocence has not yet be
en tarnished by too many adult facts. And maybe… if I’m really lucky, sometime during the evening, I will get a glimpse of Icabod Crane being chased by the Headless Horseman through Sleepy Hollow. That would be great!
Happy Halloween
Love, Dad
Photo Credits:
- Jack-O-Lantern: www.solarnavigator.net
- Icabod Crane: www.britannica.com