Touch

All Hallow's Eve. Samhain. Halloween.

Call it what you like but once you cross over from Here to There, it's the biggest day of the year--the one you look forward to the most. The day when the World of the Living and the World of the Dead--Here and There--touch for just a few short hours. It's the day when the veil is thin; the door is wide open.

Don't get me wrong! I journey back and forth all the time... usually when you're asleep though. I like to check in, see that everything's okay... see that you're okay. But it's hard to get your attention. A puff of smoke in the corner of your eye or a yellow bird. You hear me calling to you but then tell yourself that you were just imagining it. You dream of me... but your memory is foggy. But tonight--Halloween night--you're thinking of me, all of us... the dead. Your eyes are on me, waiting, wondering if you'll see me or hear me. It's easy to reach out to you when you're looking for me.

I've got to go! The door between Here and There has been open for a few hours now and I have a long list of people I want to get to see today...

 

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A very Happy Halloween to you all! At last! The greatest day of the year has arrived and I hope you all manage to have a magical, spooky time today with family and friends and a few monsters too...

 

I was originally going to try to write a scary story for today, but then I got thinking about what Halloween is all about, how it all started. This is the day that the veil between the world of the living and the dead is at it's thinnest. You don't know who--or what--you are passing down the street on this day. Those amazing costumes you see? They might be a bit more real than you imagined. Here and There is touching today, the door is wide open, and there's no knowing who you'll bump into today!

 

I was wondering what There does to celebrate this day (imagine all of the different customs and cultures collected from all the diverse people over There!) and I imagined that it is one of the busiest days of the year for them. They don't have to sneak into your dreams to visit you. They can come to you head on, because that is what Halloween is all about. You all know who I'm waiting for... May you all be visited by someone you love today, get a little spooked, and eat your weight in candy.

 

Happy Halloween!!

 

a.r.w.

Samhainophile

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Now you can't say I didn't warn you! I guess I can be a bit more macabre than I thought... My husband likes to point out how I enjoy talking about death and other weird, dark things so I might as well admit it and embrace it! Besides, there's only 54 days left until Halloween.

 

Today, I was inspired by something I actually wrote in my blog yesterday:

 

Despite my overly peppy and optimistic personality that I choose to show to other people, inside I have bats flying in my soul, black cats hopping from rib to rib, and a full moon hangs where my heart should be.

 

I like to think that's a pretty good description of who I am (and many other people I know in life... you know who you are...) and I just couldn't get that image out of my head!

 

I don't claim to be an artist or a doctor... I am 100% confident that ribs do not look like that and are not in that position... However, look at the cute black cats!

 

But in all seriousness, this doodle is for all those people in my life that adore Halloween (*cough*Swartzs*cough*). We keep it bottled up inside of us for ten months of the year and the minute summer ends we unleash our obsession and glee on those unfortunate enough to be around us.

 

Autumn is a magical time. It's almost as if the Earth is a phoenix. Just as it is dying, it bursts into flames--a beautiful display of color--only to rise up again when the snow has melted. Everything is dying and yet it is so beautiful. If a tree that simply is can die so beautifully, it gives me hope that I, as a living, breathing, moving, thinking, feeling human being can have an equally beautiful death.

 

And Halloween just adds to the magic of the season. It makes you look around and see the world a bit different--twisted. Is your neighbor really a witch like you've always suspected? That black cat has been watching you for quite some time... perhaps it knows something. The creaks in your house are suddenly the light footsteps of little ghost children. We are all witches and ghost hunters... not our mundane, 9-5 normal selves we pretend to be. And for us samhainophiles, we wish it could always be Halloween... We wish we didn't have to keep it bottled up inside of us all year long.

 

But perhaps that's what makes this time of year so special... It is only a month (okay, two months for me) and then *poof!* it is gone. The bats and cats and spooks return to their hiding place in your heart, where you keep them safe and close until it's time to pull them out again next year.

 

Sorry, folks! Halloween is in full swing for me... And I hope it is for you, too.

 

a.r.w.