Sam Hain And The Weeny Hallows
Nov. 1st, 2007 09:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chelidonI love the New England enthusiasm for Halloween. It's not just a recent thing, it's tradition -- long before Halloween became a "cool" modern holiday, people here were spending months preparing for it, decorating houses, creating costumes, making elaborate haunted houses, and putting on events like the Keene Pumpkin Festival, where the entire town, from kids in school to retirees in rest homes, spend a month prior carving pumpkins which are displayed throughout the town, including on four huge towers of pumpkins arranged at the four quarters of the town square. They're SERIOUS about this stuff. This year, they had 25,644 pumpkins. And now the town is trying to figure out how to get back into world-record territory, somewhere up about 30,000. This particular festival isn't an old one, going back only to 1991, but Halloween harvest festivals, and giving the day its proper due, goes way back.
But Keene is the "big city" (somewhere around 25,000 people). Around our little village of perhaps 1/10 that size, we're not so grandiose, but almost all of the houses along the main street in town (well, really, the only major street in town) are decorated to the hilt, covered with cobwebs, gravid with graveyards, and scattered with skeletons, pumpkins, ghosts, and scarecrows -- which kids and people in the town get together and build for two months prior to Halloween. My favorite this year are two scarecrows eloping out of a second-story window, complete with ladder and luggage.
Then on Halloween night, the police department (all 2 1/2 of them) and the volunteer fire department stop traffic on either end of town to warn drivers to drive slowly and watch out for kids, and hand out glowsticks to all the kids and parents who come out and trick-or-treat, and there are a LOT of them. It's one of the few reasons I regret not living "in town," because out where we are, there's really no trick-or-treaters, you'd have to hike for a mile just to hit a dozen houses. Next year, though, we're talking about doing a full-blown haunted house out in the barn, complete with smoke machines, elaborate props and puppets, sound effects and in each stall, a live "scene" (er, the kid-friendly kind).
Anyway, this year the Headless Horseman from last year (one of our farmer neighbors), was joined by her companion, both in full garb (and headless, of course), riding up and down through the town. One fellow came out of his house in costume and mask wielding a working chainsaw (minus the chain) and ran around chasing kids. The four full-time town workers were all in front of the town hall dressed as witches, handing out candy, and all the folks in the library got into it in grand style.
Me, I did what I've been intending to do for a couple of years now -- I reaped. Have scythe, will travel. The kids were gratifyingly scared -- I had fun earlier in the day collecting my son from his after-school program in costume, silently walking in, looking around, pointing at him, and walking out. During the evening, the chainsaw dude and myself got into a discussion at one point where I pointed out to him that the Old Ways were best, scythes never run out of gas. He told me he came out as a Reaper about 10 years back, and was thinking about going back to it, now that gas was getting so expensive ;> When we stopped by the firehouse, while my Beamish Boy was blissfully crawling around the ladder truck, one of the volunteer firemen suggested that I could come over and mow her lawn anytime (not a euphemism, I think, she was serious), and we got into a conversation about proper scythe technique.
Some pics of Mr. Death are here.
I think my favorite of the bunch may be this one, because even though the smile isn't traditional, it shows that He really does love His work. This one is a bit more proper.
Much fun was had by all (most of all, my Beamish Boy, who was Darth Vader this year). My Ravishing Partner was a witch (natch), and met many of her sisters last night. Lovely Housemates Tzeenj and Lylythe went out in costume to Elixir, a swanky new tapas and cocktails jazz restaurant about 30 min away to celebrate their anniversary, and later at home, joined by a former housemate who lives nearby, we did our more formal Samhain proceeding, pledging to get back into the swing of things and plan and celebrate all of the seasonal holidays together this year as we used to. It's about time. And this is going to be such a good year. I feel it in my bones.
Happy new year, many delicious harvest blessings and the joy and release of both endings and beginnings to you and yours!
But Keene is the "big city" (somewhere around 25,000 people). Around our little village of perhaps 1/10 that size, we're not so grandiose, but almost all of the houses along the main street in town (well, really, the only major street in town) are decorated to the hilt, covered with cobwebs, gravid with graveyards, and scattered with skeletons, pumpkins, ghosts, and scarecrows -- which kids and people in the town get together and build for two months prior to Halloween. My favorite this year are two scarecrows eloping out of a second-story window, complete with ladder and luggage.
Then on Halloween night, the police department (all 2 1/2 of them) and the volunteer fire department stop traffic on either end of town to warn drivers to drive slowly and watch out for kids, and hand out glowsticks to all the kids and parents who come out and trick-or-treat, and there are a LOT of them. It's one of the few reasons I regret not living "in town," because out where we are, there's really no trick-or-treaters, you'd have to hike for a mile just to hit a dozen houses. Next year, though, we're talking about doing a full-blown haunted house out in the barn, complete with smoke machines, elaborate props and puppets, sound effects and in each stall, a live "scene" (er, the kid-friendly kind).
Anyway, this year the Headless Horseman from last year (one of our farmer neighbors), was joined by her companion, both in full garb (and headless, of course), riding up and down through the town. One fellow came out of his house in costume and mask wielding a working chainsaw (minus the chain) and ran around chasing kids. The four full-time town workers were all in front of the town hall dressed as witches, handing out candy, and all the folks in the library got into it in grand style.
Me, I did what I've been intending to do for a couple of years now -- I reaped. Have scythe, will travel. The kids were gratifyingly scared -- I had fun earlier in the day collecting my son from his after-school program in costume, silently walking in, looking around, pointing at him, and walking out. During the evening, the chainsaw dude and myself got into a discussion at one point where I pointed out to him that the Old Ways were best, scythes never run out of gas. He told me he came out as a Reaper about 10 years back, and was thinking about going back to it, now that gas was getting so expensive ;> When we stopped by the firehouse, while my Beamish Boy was blissfully crawling around the ladder truck, one of the volunteer firemen suggested that I could come over and mow her lawn anytime (not a euphemism, I think, she was serious), and we got into a conversation about proper scythe technique.
Some pics of Mr. Death are here.
I think my favorite of the bunch may be this one, because even though the smile isn't traditional, it shows that He really does love His work. This one is a bit more proper.
Much fun was had by all (most of all, my Beamish Boy, who was Darth Vader this year). My Ravishing Partner was a witch (natch), and met many of her sisters last night. Lovely Housemates Tzeenj and Lylythe went out in costume to Elixir, a swanky new tapas and cocktails jazz restaurant about 30 min away to celebrate their anniversary, and later at home, joined by a former housemate who lives nearby, we did our more formal Samhain proceeding, pledging to get back into the swing of things and plan and celebrate all of the seasonal holidays together this year as we used to. It's about time. And this is going to be such a good year. I feel it in my bones.
Happy new year, many delicious harvest blessings and the joy and release of both endings and beginnings to you and yours!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 02:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 07:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 08:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-02 02:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 03:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 07:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 04:24 pm (UTC)''towers of pumpkins''!
I am just astounded. In the best way.
Thanks for the picture and reportage, and the wellwishes.
A happy new year to you and yours also.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 07:42 pm (UTC)You were at the October camp in Mass., yes? Whereabouts are you from?
no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 11:19 pm (UTC)I'm from Orlando, Florida.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 11:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 05:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 06:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 06:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 06:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 06:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 06:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 07:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 09:27 pm (UTC)I use advanced browsers on an old computer that is running Windows 98, partly because it has to and partly because I hate XP and Vista.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 09:34 pm (UTC)I hear ya about XP/Vista. I've had to design, build and manage way too many systems to want to deal with that #$^#$% at home, where all of the boxen are either OS X or Linux.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 09:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 06:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 07:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-01 09:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-02 08:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-02 08:32 pm (UTC)So, you mean...Death becomes me? *grin*