In which Halloween consumes my waking hours
Today is Halloween.
This is one of the most exciting days of my year. It is (as I see it) the beginning of the Holiday Season. We invite all friends in for Halloween Supper and many of us delight in accompanying Evan on his appointed post-nightfall rounds. This year the weather promises to be clear, dry and cold, which is a bit unusual in Denver. We expect a lot of Trick-or-Treaters, although the RSVPs from friends have been pretty thin. We'll likely get the usual crowd - Arwen, Guillaume, and Rivka. Dinner has been in the works for days now, since I expect that I'll be spending a lot of the day getting ready.
Like Bret, I plan to post pictures of the Halloween costumes late tonight; until then I'll simply say that this year I've done a costume that I've wanted to do for a couple of years, but haven't had the time. I have rediscovered my inner Goth.
Only Bret, Brian, Rick, Chris, and Griffin will recall the Goth Melanie from the KU days. And maybe Mother, who I recall was not just a bit put off by the predominance of black in my wardrobe. Those were of course the pre-SCA days, and the natural colored long hair seemed to be a requisite to doing it "right", so I re-styled myself more within the mainstream.
There is a lot that attracts me to the Goth lifestyle. I'm not into the culture of death, but there is a lot of appeal to the concept of disintegration and chaos as a means to an end. In research and organization, results come out of chaos. It is necessary to gather together a wide variety of people, opinions, methods and findings to create a whole that has merit. Sometimes the result must be disintegrated to achieve a bigger, better, or more valid result. It is a necessary part of the creative cycle. It is also a part of the natural cycle, which always seems to be foremost in my thoughts in the fall and spring.
So here we are on Hallow'en, Samhain, La Dia de los Muertes. It is the end of the Celtic year, and in many ways the gardening year as this is the typical date of the hard frost - and yes, last night was a hard one. I have cleaned out a lot of the garden. The remaining tomatoes that survived a frost two weeks ago are now compost. The irises divided from Chris' recently deceased grandmother's yard have been nourished by the compost made of last years' pumpkin patch haul, and so they cycle continues. The snowstorm that followed the frost brought down limbs and leaves, and they too have found their way to the iris bed as mulch. Chris says that these irises are lovely, and so I anticipate the beginning of the growth of next spring, even as we celebrate the death of this garden season. Tomorrow's All Saints Day reminds us that what has gone before us continues to nourish us - both people and produce.
Tonight I will contemplate passings. The past few years have seen the coming of new and dear friends and a beautiful child, Evan. There have been far too many funerals, though. But today, I still have preparations for tonight. There is cooking left to do, and black roses to make, and Spiderman's nose must be re-located. There are still four whole pumpkins that must be dealt with, and a trip to the supermarket for cabbage and a pumpkin in which to cook the casserole. And so I'll stop ruminating, and get busy.
This is one of the most exciting days of my year. It is (as I see it) the beginning of the Holiday Season. We invite all friends in for Halloween Supper and many of us delight in accompanying Evan on his appointed post-nightfall rounds. This year the weather promises to be clear, dry and cold, which is a bit unusual in Denver. We expect a lot of Trick-or-Treaters, although the RSVPs from friends have been pretty thin. We'll likely get the usual crowd - Arwen, Guillaume, and Rivka. Dinner has been in the works for days now, since I expect that I'll be spending a lot of the day getting ready.
Like Bret, I plan to post pictures of the Halloween costumes late tonight; until then I'll simply say that this year I've done a costume that I've wanted to do for a couple of years, but haven't had the time. I have rediscovered my inner Goth.
Only Bret, Brian, Rick, Chris, and Griffin will recall the Goth Melanie from the KU days. And maybe Mother, who I recall was not just a bit put off by the predominance of black in my wardrobe. Those were of course the pre-SCA days, and the natural colored long hair seemed to be a requisite to doing it "right", so I re-styled myself more within the mainstream.
There is a lot that attracts me to the Goth lifestyle. I'm not into the culture of death, but there is a lot of appeal to the concept of disintegration and chaos as a means to an end. In research and organization, results come out of chaos. It is necessary to gather together a wide variety of people, opinions, methods and findings to create a whole that has merit. Sometimes the result must be disintegrated to achieve a bigger, better, or more valid result. It is a necessary part of the creative cycle. It is also a part of the natural cycle, which always seems to be foremost in my thoughts in the fall and spring.
So here we are on Hallow'en, Samhain, La Dia de los Muertes. It is the end of the Celtic year, and in many ways the gardening year as this is the typical date of the hard frost - and yes, last night was a hard one. I have cleaned out a lot of the garden. The remaining tomatoes that survived a frost two weeks ago are now compost. The irises divided from Chris' recently deceased grandmother's yard have been nourished by the compost made of last years' pumpkin patch haul, and so they cycle continues. The snowstorm that followed the frost brought down limbs and leaves, and they too have found their way to the iris bed as mulch. Chris says that these irises are lovely, and so I anticipate the beginning of the growth of next spring, even as we celebrate the death of this garden season. Tomorrow's All Saints Day reminds us that what has gone before us continues to nourish us - both people and produce.
Tonight I will contemplate passings. The past few years have seen the coming of new and dear friends and a beautiful child, Evan. There have been far too many funerals, though. But today, I still have preparations for tonight. There is cooking left to do, and black roses to make, and Spiderman's nose must be re-located. There are still four whole pumpkins that must be dealt with, and a trip to the supermarket for cabbage and a pumpkin in which to cook the casserole. And so I'll stop ruminating, and get busy.
posted by Melanie Unruh-Bays at
10:48 AM
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