Momento Mori

Today is the start of Samhain, the day when the walls between the worlds grow thin and our deceased ancestors and friends may yet come to visit us.

Today is also Halloween and we're taking Róisín, in her guise as Cowgirl Jessie, out for her first time Trick or Treating. I'm making Irish stew for dinner and we have an apple pie for dessert...and then we'll go out and join the hundreds of other parents taking their kids out.

Samhain and Halloween are where the two worlds join in my house. I will leave an empty plate for the ancestors and explain to my daughter (though she may not get it yet) who we are remembering, and I will light a candle (in this case, an LED light inside a votive holder) for loved ones to find their way home. My husband, whose beliefs are and always have been his own, may not understand my need to do these things, but he accepts them.

So today, I remember....

Sochi, my cat and my friend, who died in November of last year at the old age of 17. I miss you, my friend.

Chan, who brought (and continues to bring) such joy to my life through her art. She died in March this year....much too soon for all who loved and knew her.

My grandmother, who died eight years ago this October. We never really connected enough to know each other while she was alive; too many years and too much gulf of personality divided us, but still, I remember you.

My cats Tasha and Tess, who died within months of each other, twenty years ago. I've never forgotten you two.

And finally, I remember the men, women, and children---living and dead---who were or who are being persecuted as witches. The Burning Times didn't just happen in Europe and America, centuries ago; they're happening now, in Africa and the Middle East.


May your Samhain, or Halloween, be a peaceful one. Blessed be.

These are a few of my favorite things....

My daughter turns four in December (four!!!) and this is the first year she's really gotten into the Halloween idea of dressing up. However, as anyone who's ever been around a preschooler can tell you, time and patience aren't really their strong points (well, patience still isn't one of mine...:-P) so for the last two weeks, her dad and I have been doing the "No, Halloween is x amount of days away" thing.

In the meantime, she's dressed up as other things around the house. She's put on her kitty mask, thrown a blanket over her head like a hood and asked me, "Where's Catherine?" (Yeah, like that guy LOLOLOL.) She's also put her candy bucket on top of her head and announced she's Buzz Lightyear (though her dad made an Ichabod Crane quip that totally went over her head.)

I've been tired and frazzled and a little frustrated by life in general recently, and the holiday season is bound to make things worse, not better. So it was nice to have the reminder of the joys of being a parent---to see the world anew in the eyes of a child, to see her turn blankets and legos and boxes and ordinary objects into things of magic. :)

Sometimes, Life is Like That.

...sometimes, you're talking to a co-worker and she makes a comment that she's missing a toe and you remember, because she told you once, that she and her sister fled the Khmer Rouge as children.

...sometimes, you're talking to another co-worker, all happy and nervous because she and her husband have decided to have a family and she's talking to you because you're the voice of experience...and you remember, four years ago, that you knew nothing. Experience doesn't make you an expert...but you tell her what you know and what you'd wanted someone to tell you four years ago.

...sometimes, you're having That Kind of day, and then your email goes off with emails from insanely funny friends all over the country and you start laughing because in all the inside jokes and mangled words are people who truly Get It, linked by something we can't explain. And things seem...lighter, somehow.

Sometimes, in the course of one day, life is like that. :)

Turn, Turn, Turn...:-)

(And yes, if that puts you in mind of a song from the 1960s, that's the point. :-D)

Things are changing at our house---in a good way---that's making me blink at just how fast things are happening. My daughter is about to finish her third month of preschool, and aside from one minor melt-down when she abruptly realized her daddy wasn't right there with her, she's really enjoying it. She's growing and changing and just, well....becoming more and more of a person each day. Which isn't to say she was a walking asparagus or something before...but I look at her and I recognize bits of myself or my husband in the way she reacts or behaves. I don't know who she's going to grow into, but I bet the ride is going to be interesting, to say the least. :-P

And my husband is trying to reenter the workforce after having been a full time stay at home dad for the last four years. With the economy being what it is, I don't really expect things to happen fast, but for the last four years, it's been me leaving and going to work and coming home. It'll be a switch to see my husband doing the same.

Not much has changed with me lately, but the changes are all around me. As we head towards Samhain and the end of the year, I suppose that's only natural. :)