All Hallows Eve

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It is Sweetpea's first real Halloween. She has been celebrating this holiday sense soon after being born but this is the first time she has become aware of candy, costumes and getting into trick or treating. As a parent I am conflicted by Halloween. I love the holiday, the DIY qualities of meeting your neighbors, the art installations on front lawns, the costumes and yes, even the gathering of candy. I love that this pagan holiday addressing death in this season still is celebrated in a mainstream way with the lighting of candles and carving of jack o lanterns. 

My main issue with Halloween, besides all the corn syrup, is the idea of witches. Medicine women, healers, herbalists, are the people we call witches. These women were put on trial and often burned at the stake during the dark ages. The villainizing of these medicine women lives on today in our green skinned, crooked nosed, caricatures of women people call witches. She rides around on her broom scooping up children and eating them. It’s a terrible and scary image. Girls dress up like witches today reenacting these “evil” women. Yes there have been some exceptions to this, good witches, Samantha on the show "Bewitched" and more recently Hermione Granger, but most of the time the old, ugly, hag is what I see being the most played out. There has been a lot of reclaiming of the word witch in the pagan community. Now folks wear the pointed hat with pride. What I see in the main stream culture though is a complete lack of understanding of who witches really are. They are different from the other made up ghouls of Halloween.  

 I try to be relaxed about what is enacted on Halloween, every society has a shadow side and this is the place young and old alike get to try things out.  At the same time, the thought in the back of my head is, “really, we are still dragging this old concept of women healers as villains out of the closet again?” I remember being so scared of witches as a young person, It would have been nice to have a broader perspective of these misunderstood women healers. It looks a little like the way folks wear other cultures dress during Halloween and think its ok to pretend to be that person for the night. I think most folks are coming from a place of play with this but I have seen how hurtful it can be to my friends from the cultures that get the most Halloween attention, like Arab and Indian people.

 My family celebrates Samhain, the pagan holiday that honors our ancestors and this season of dying. This morning we watched the sunrise and lit our jack o lanterns welcoming our ancestors into our home for the day. Sweetpea and I decorated our family alter with pictures and memorabilia of family members and pets that have passed from our lives; she decorated with candy and some marigolds. We will make a pumpkin pie to feast on this afternoon and think about all our beloved dead and all the folks that recently lost their lives from the intense hurricane Sandy. After pie and candles we will get dressed in costumes and join the hordes of children and care givers on the street tonight playing in the community game that is Halloween. I hope to give Sweetpea this balance growing up, understanding who witches really are, taking a moment to notice all the amazing people and animals that pass into and out of our lives and the sweetness of family, community fun.