Showing posts with label Halloween. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Halloween. Show all posts

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

All Hallows and Halloween

Okay. You may or may not be aware of this movement to replace Halloween with JesusWeen.

What is particularly laughable about this campaign, other than the rather unfortunate-sounding name, is the fact that clearly the organizers have no idea what the Hallo in Halloween means: It's from hallows. As in saints.

Because today, November 1st, is All Saints' Day.

All Saints' Day is a religious feast day in honor of all saints, "known and unknown." All Souls' Day follows it on November 2nd and, just like it sounds, is a commemoration of those who have departed. This is a very spiritually positive series of days.

So why do we associate the night before All Hallows' (Saints')---which would be All Hallows' Eve (Hallow'een)---with tricks and the devil and whatnot?

Traditionally this night was regarded as the best time for divination games, possibly as hold-over from the pagan holiday of Samhain, when the veil between this and the Otherworld was thinnest. These games often revolved around predicting the occupation of your future husband, something of vital importance to girls in the past, when they could not hold occupations themselves and their status in life would rely upon their husband's. (Such divination games led to the witch hysteria in Salem, by the way.)
It was also thought that spirits roamed the land during Samhain---not bad spirits, all spirits. But since the day was for saints, it is easy to see how the night might come to be associated with bad spirits.

In 20th century America, children would take the role of bad spirits and get up to mischief (Mischief Night) by playing tricks and pranks on their neighbors. The whole "bribe those children with candy" idea wasn't a nation-wide movement until the 1950s, when the night's emphasis was deliberately shifted from tricks to treats to make Halloween a more family-friendly (and less destructive) event.

So it's kinda funny that now there are people who think Halloween isn't family-friendly at all.

But what could be more wholesome than the traditional Halloween game of bobbing for apples, right?



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Sunday, October 30, 2011

Witches of Salem


Witches have become an intrinsic part of Salem, Massachusetts.
You don't see ads like the above anymore, of course. Although that sort of positive, Witches Can Help philosophy is much present. Very unlike the ad I describe in HIDDEN HISTORY OF SALEM (an ad that uses the hanging of Salem witches to sell a product and can be found if you search my website - it's hidden).
You can't find the famous Witch Spoon at Daniel Low anymore (the building currently houses Rockafella's) but you can find all sorts of authentic experiences, such as at the Witch House
where witch trials' Judge Jonathan Corwin lived. 
Or you can sit in the Salem Witch Trials Memorial and commune with the spirits of those who died.
Each of the stones jutting from the walls represents a person, and is inscribed with their name and the date they were hanged (or in one case, crushed). We don't know where their actual bodies are, or even where they were executed (something I address in HIDDEN HISTORY).

You can also learn to be a witch from the Official Witch of Salem herself

No, not like that.

Witchcraft involves studying and classes and workshops. Not near Salem? Check out Laurie Cabot, our Official Witch on YouTube.

Of course, some would rather Salem not focus on the witch aspect so much, but when your local police department's official patch looks like this:
You should really just accept that witches and Salem go together and are here to stay.


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Thursday, October 27, 2011

Set Sail For Horror

I commissioned Francesco Francavilla for something Lovecraftian with cats
and this is the fabulous, wickedly brilliant picture he created for me!!!

So I thought I'd share it with you, since it is Halloween-time.



Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Fried Dough in Salem













Haunted Happenings time in Salem and that means FRIED DOUGH!

I love fried dough. I also love the Yankee plain-speaking brevity that makes a person call it as they see it. While elsewhere in the United States these delicious treats are known by fantastically romantic names like Dragon Ears or Elephant Ears, here in Massachusetts they're just ... Fried Dough.

'Cause...y'know...that's what it is.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Death Stalks the Common

Last weekend the music video cast and crew for the song based on my book HIDDEN HISTORY OF SALEM was in Salem filming. Apparently someone called the police about the man who was playing Death in the video, telling the cops a "scary man" with "a real axe" was on Salem Common.

Here he is, relocated to the wharf, the scary dude and his real axe:

I feel your fear. 
I know if I assure you he's the sweetest fella in the world, you wouldn't believe me, right?
*sigh*
Caller, you waste police time. Salem, don't let me down like this again.

An Arachnophobe's Nightmare

More Halloween decorations in Salem Massachusetts.

Monday, October 17, 2011

Fallout and Assassin's Creed (ish) Halloween Decor

Halloween decorations in Salem, MA.
The biohazard reminds me of Fallout.
And yes, that is a plague doctor in black behind the guy in the hazmat suit.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

Salem Halloween Ferris Wheel

The carnival has returned to Salem Massachusetts. I love the witch on the ferris wheel.
It's all part of Salem's Haunted Happenings, which run the entire length of October.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Hidden History of Salem Video with New Soundtrack

I have re-done my HIDDEN HISTORY OF SALEM book-teaser
because MY BOOK INSPIRED A SONG
and that is just too cool not to share:
There's real history plus cool obscure facts plus ghost cats and candy and coffee and romance and a horrible murder - all sorts of interesting things. And we haven't even gotten to the witches.
Buy the single, too! It should be coming out in the next month or so. I'll keep you posted. 

Friday, October 30, 2009

Halloween and Pagans

Yet again, people with good intentions are out on the walking mall trying to save the souls of Halloween celebrants. And once again I have to laugh.

Because Wiccans don't celebrate Halloween.

Wiccans and pagans in the Celtic tradition celebrate Samhain (most commonly pronounced Sow (ow as in ouch) - inn). This ancient holiday is considered New Year's Eve on their wheel of the year.

It is also considered a time when the veil between this world and the next, the Otherworld, is thinnest, so spirits of the departed can cross over and come home. You're not going to be traipsing around the neighborhood when you're expecting company. You eat a silent, reverent meal, thinking of the departed, and leave goodies - foods they liked - outside for them.

Enter the Christian era.

Samhain (which is properly November 1st, but the Celts counted their days as beginning the night before, so November 1st actually starts the night of October 31st) shares its holiday with All Saints' Day.

Just like it sounds, All Saints' Day is a feast day to remember saints and martyrs. These are "hallowed" (blessed) people. So this feast day was also called All Hallows' Day. The night before it would then logically be All Hallows' Eve, eventually to become Halloween.

I have heard it said that people came to believe because All Hallows' Day was a saintly day, the angry/jealous forces of darkness walked abroad the night before - which is how Halloween got its spooky/dangerous vibe.

In any case, over time, an evening that had been about welcoming your dearly departed became an evening to be feared.

In the modern age, this mostly took the form of children playing "tricks." A night of vandalism that you could blame on the forces of evil.

The Turner Classic Movies TV channel periodically runs a short, black & white film about Halloween customs that was made in like the 1950s, and it attributes the "trick or treat"-begging-for-candy-around-the-neighborhood tradition to a deliberate movement in small towns. The town leaders wanted to organize children into doing something positive (or at least parentally-accompanied) on Halloween rather than being purely destructive - a movement which caught on across the country. Whether you believe that old film or not, Halloween today is generally celebrated as a sugar-feast day where children collect all the candy they can.

Unless you live in Salem, Massachusetts.

In Salem, Halloween is much like Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Only without the beads. And it lasts for a month.

You'll find adults wearing costumes more often than children. And all month long, not just on Halloween.

There are street musicians, street dancers, street vendors...the air smells of grilled sausages and fried dough and roasted peanuts.

You can get kitschy witch stuff or you can meet actual, self-proclaimed witches.

You can also visit the Memorial to the victims of the Salem Witch Trials - who are probably spinning in their graves (if we knew where their graves were) about all this. Sometimes we forget that these people were so NOT witches that they would not say they were even to save their lives.

But let's return to the street party.

On Halloween itself, people of all ages in all sorts of costumes join the scrum that is downtown. 100,000 people are generally expected, especially when Halloween lands on a Saturday. Add that to the 40,000 townies and you can barely move on the sidewalk.

Yet a jovial, friendly atmosphere is maintained. Everyone smiles at each other. Strangers compliment other strangers' costumes. For that large a number of people, it's very Woodstock. Peace and love.

The only sour note you will find are the few people - probably from miles and miles away - who come every year with bullhorns that scream and garishly large placards that proclaim how we are all going to Hell. Because we're downtown dressed in costumes for Halloween - and that must mean we're godless pagans and Wiccans.

I always laugh when I see them because what they don't understand is, in this veritable sea of humanity, there are NO PAGANS.

Nope. NO WICCANS. This group has come all the way out here to literally preach to the converted.

How do I know? Because for pagans and Wiccans, this is still Samhain. A serious holiday of reflection. Where one cooks for the dearly departed and stays home quietly and thinks about them.

They aren't the hedonistic partiers. It's the rest of us.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Bizarre Bazaar

This weekend is the Salem Bizarre Bazaar!

From the Salem Chamber of Commerce:
"Fun for all ages, this street festival has something for everyone. Crafts, jewelry, paintings, stained glass, and other unique items will be featured along the Essex Pedestrian Mall. Street performers, face painters, and musicians will entertain all."

Visit Salem's Official Haunted Happenings blog for more images!