The True Spirit of Halloween

Tis the season - ignore the advent calendars and Santa effigies crowding the supermarkets, we still have a few festivals to go before big daddy Christmas comes round. No, I’m talking about the time of doorstep jack o’ lanterns and the inevitable guilt that comes from throwing 5kg of pumpkin flesh into the bin because you’re too intimidated to make soup with it. Halloween is here again, ready to fright and delight those who partake in another Pagan-cum-Christian festival.

I wasn’t much for Halloween as it simply wasn’t a big deal in the UK until recently. Three decades ago, when I was growing up, I don’t remember there being much autumnification of households. Nowadays, a walk around my neighbourhood reveals ever more ghoulish accessories in windows and if last year is anything to go by, there will likely be more trick-or-treaters calling tonight than there will be December carollers. As Halloween’s stock rises, it seems as if Christmas’ falls.

I suppose with less financial and familial obligation to Halloween, it is a more attractive option for parents and partiers, who need only splash out on a cheap costume, a pumpkin and a box of Quality Street to be ready for the event, rather than having to furnish all the trappings of Christmas. And now that many fireworks events have been cancelled due to local council cutbacks, a self-directed celebration on October 31st has also overtaken the traditional UK Bonfire Night as the main feature of the early winter season.

It really didn’t make much of a difference to me until this year. An occasion I had seen as superfluous and a bit silly, has taken on much more meaning for the saddest of reasons. Earlier in the year I lost a dear friend. Actually, that’s a euphemism used purely for writing etiquette. I didn’t want to startle you by suddenly dumping the coarse, brutal concept of death in a blog about a seemingly fun festival.

Earlier in the year, an incredibly dear friend of mine died. Not that age makes a difference to the perceived tragedy of loss, but he was the same age as me. He had so much ahead of him.

It’s not so much the general pity of losing a young adult that affects me, my grief is altogether more selfish. What will I do without him*?* I can’t help seeing the loss (that word again) in personal terms. Yes, I am stricken for the world at large, which will be infinitely poorer for him not being in it, but I care more for his absence in my world. Where once there was my friend, all I have now is the imitation product of memory. Remembering someone is wholly inadequate compared to a real life interaction. I would like to be more benevolent in my reaction to his death, to be satisfied with the memories and to just be grateful for having known him as long as I did, but I am not there yet. I am not there.

So instead, I have cast about for other things to get me through my irritated, disbelieving grief. I now understand why every hospital has access to chaplaincy services. In exceptional times, the pull toward the spiritual is great. I long for so much that only the mystical can pretend to provide. I want there to be meaning behind the darkness and insanity of circumstances. I want there to be comfort from some all-knowing, all-powerful-but-kind being, who can whisper ‘don’t worry, I have the cheat sheet to life and it’s all good because...’ And most of all, I crave a magical loophole that allows me to interact with my friend again.

Allhallowtide is a span of three days from 31st October to 2nd November, and in the Christian tradition, is a time of remembrance for the dead and the saints. If Neil Gaiman’s Graveyard Book and Disney’s Coco are to be believed (more familiar terms of reference for me), then it is the time when the veil between the living and the dead is at its thinnest. This echoes the Pagan festival of Samhain, where a lot of Halloween traditions come from.

For me, I’ll take it. I don’t care about Dracula dentures and cobweb decorations (I’ve got plenty of the latter anyway), I yearn for the true meaning of Halloween, which is a time when the spiritual world is closer, or at least given more attention than usual. It’s still an affront that these are the realms I am now interested in, given the unacceptable context of the death of my friend, however, if it is a chance to focus on him, or at best, feel closer to him, then I’ll certainly take it.

So yes, there’ll be a pumpkin this year, but more important than the carving, will be the lighting of the candle in memory of my friend. And if I can put aside my sceptical nature, maybe Halloween will provide me with something not necessarily associated with the occasion: some comfort.