There is an idea, tantalizing in luminoscity, that a Halloween celebration can be made perfect.
I am of the opinion that, Halloween as a holiday, is itself perfect, and thus the celebrations already are — big and small, commercial or homebrewd, with countless friends and lovers or alone with a book and blanket.
Halloween is one of the great pleasures in my life. Both the holiday as well as the spirit, which I celebrate year-long. A celebration built from a lifetime of memories, experiments, successes and failures, themselves built from materials developed by countless hands and claws, minds on sleepless nights, ghosts, haunted places, plans, mistakes, mishaps, happenstances.
Because it is so important to me, I am always tempted to create the "Perfect Halloween."
Full of activity and energy, somehow with the exact combination of far-flung famous haunted house as well as neighborhood haunts. Great feasts and costume parties, intimate gatherings and dumb suppers with friends and loved ones.
Giving back more energy than I put in to ensure everyone is having, for themselves, the Perfect Holiday.
A concept as exhausting as it is impossible. Not because of the all-too-mortal limits of time, or the equally always-too-small limits of budget. It is because Halloween, at the core, can be perfect simply by existing.
That feeling in my stomach when I see the first black and orange display case at the grocery store. The delight when the television commercials start skewing a bit more fun and sinister. The day the air turns crisp for the first time of the year.
The February day I am writing a letter to someone and draw a jack-o-lantern on an envelope, the July afternoon when I am idly deciding what to watch while I work (The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror S9 E4 is my personal favorite… specifically, the Easy Bake Coven segment.)
October is an all-to-short 31 days, roughly 8.49315% of the year, give or take a bit.
I think of it like dessert, the rest of the year is a meal — wonderful and filling and full of conversation and laughter. October is when the coffee is served and the big dishes are cleared, the treats are brought out, the fires are burning a bit lower, the night lurks a bit darker, and the well-earned exhaustion retreats a bit, for a few more rounds.
Like Linus, I go out into the pumpkin patch year after year to await the arrival of the Great Pumpkin, absorbing the privilege and secrets of the moon’s glow. Through this, I become a Great Pumpkin. In treats and cards, in action, in art. In just how I live my life.
Halloween, by common practice, is a single day on the calendar. Sometimes there is a bit of community stretching, an extra night or possibly a weekend, maybe even a week. An all-too brief period of time for all but the spooky fellows whom extend it far longer for themselves, sometimes all year.
With the narrowness of this window, it is natural — almost inevitable — to have too long a list of decorations, parties, events, readings, movies, everything, to handle in time. Whenever this feels like pressure, whenever I am caught in the throws of missing out or not doing enough, I return to the pumpkin patch.
Every year’s October is different.
There is always too much, maybe there should always be too much, because this keeps the energy alive and vibrant and flowing.
For that matter, the flow of Halloween within the year changes, similarly so!
Every few days, every new haunted activity is different! Traditions build and crash, echo and contradict. More than a part, this actually is the holiday magic.
Big or small, full of activity or full of quiet reading and television, with a hundred friends or spent alone under a blanket, be it October 31 or May 18, I wish to you all (and to myself) a very happy Halloween.
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