¡Feliz Dia de los Muertos, Calabaza Grande y Señior Araña!

Last year I tried, obviously in vain, to get people to focus on children, innocence, candy, and pretend at Halloween, instead of violence, evil, mischief and the occult. If you remember back that far, I wrote about Charlie Brown, Linus, and the Great Pumpkin (Calabaza Grande). Let me have another stab at it.

By the way, last year we encouraged Grace to choose a cute, maybe even feminine costume, like a princess or an angel or fairy or something like that, but what did she choose? A fireman. Excuse me, a fire-FIGHTER, not gender specific. I THINK it had to do with the fact that we went costume shopping right after Noah’s Ark Preschool took its field trip to the fire station.

Go ahead and take a look at this week’s front page- I’m plenty proud. Mind you, I’m a pretty progressive dad. I really believe Grace can be anything she wants to when she grows up, even President (although why would anyone want to?), there are already plenty of women firefighters, so I was all for it, what the heck.

Last weekend we were visiting cousins up in Sioux Falls and decided to ask Grace what she’d like to be for Halloween this year.

Spiderman.

Hmmm. How about Barbie? –No, ‘Pie der mawn- Oh, look honey, it’s Belle from Beauty and the Beast. –No, SPAWDERMAHN-

Okay, Spiderman. Forget that he’s a he. It took a really long time to convince Grace that she could be queen and being queen is just as good or better than being king (ex: Queen Elizabeth II and “king” Phillip of England), but she can never be king because she’s a girl and kings are all boys.

Spiderman shoots webs, swings between tall buildings, wears red white and blue and helps people by stopping bad guys. He’s a really smart, nice, kid next door. So great, you’ll be spider WOMAN to your Mom and I, but great. Spiders and Halloween, perfect match.

Have you tried getting your hands on a Spiderman costume lately? Not at K-Mart. ShopKo had one left, but the mask part was missing. I would say, don’t be surprised if every kid and his sister trick or treats as Spiderman, because the stores can’t seem to keep them on the shelves!

If Grace comes to your door looking for candy on Saturday morning, November first, you’ll know why. It will be because Bethany ordered her Spiderman costume on the internet, but they promised to ship it within five business days, one day late and several dollars too many.

I’m frustrated anyway because whatever she dresses up as, I have to miss it. Boyer Valley has an away game so I have to haul our cheerleading squad and mascot all the way out to Lake View. How much ya wanna bet all the cheerleaders beg me to wear stupid costumes instead of their uniforms?

Say, if I shave my beard, could I pass as Saddam Hussein?

I think Ellie is going to dress like Humpty Dumpty. Who says he wasn’t a she? She was an egg for crying out loud. Eggs don’t have gender, yet. Right?

Here’s what I think. Instead of monsters and demons and witches and chainsaw murderers, let’s adapt the Mexican take on Halloween. “Dia de los Muertos,” that is, “the Day of the Dead,” is a positive, joyful, family holiday.

The Mexican point of view is that this life is a dream and when you die, you “wake up” to reality. Therefore you don’t have to be afraid of death and life is a temporary thing that doesn’t need to be taken too seriously.

Dia de los Muertos is about family. Instead of having their family reunions in July or August, families come home to be together from October 31- November 2. November 1st, as you know is a Church holiday, All Saint’s Day- the day of the dead, when Mexicans honor and remember their ancestors and the family members and loved ones who died during the previous year. Mexicans have picnics in the cemetery and decorate grave sites with flowers, colorful cut-paper banners and paper maché skeleton dolls.

November first is actually considered “Dia de los Angelitos,” day of the little children who died. Kids munch on sugar skulls with their names written on them in chocolate icing. The Devil isn’t considered a powerful arch rival to God, he is a scheming fool who doesn’t have any power over you unless you offer it to him. Sort of like Wile E. Coyote.

There’s even a special supper where whoever bites into a plastic toy skeleton baked into their sugar bread, has good luck for the next year!

Festive colors, family, faith, candy, feeling safe, feeling like you belong…that sounds wonderful. I’ll take those things over weird pagan ceremonies, zombies, vampires, blood and gore, murder and mayhem any day.

I used to like Batman when I was a kid. Dark, scary, brooding multimillionaire. But now I like Spiderman. Young, upbeat, and a freelance photographer. Keep slingin’ those wild webs Spidey (AKA: “Araña”),

¡Buenos nochés niñios y niñias!