Feliz Ano Nueva

Birthdays.

At midnight on Halloween, I will be one year older. It is a grim celebration as the clock ticks, the thread gets shorter, the body dies a little more. It's also a triumph, and in the spirit of morbidity, a realization of the number of times I've been spared death thus far. I like that my birthday coincides with the heightened awareness of death. Best of all, I love the lore associated with the holiday that traditionally was recognized as a period of marked spiritual activity.

Movies.

Women are more beautiful when they're in trouble.

As I've been taking a tour through some popular horror movies and cult favorites on Netflix, it's clear why film majors--especially female ones--obsess over these movies as relics of social norms and gender roles. Not to put too bold a point on this, but because it coincides with some of my recent reading, I'm interested in the projection of the female character as told through horror stories. We have the classic "I've fallen and I can't get up" damsel, the punishable shrew who dies first and we applaud it, the brain-dead amorous girlfriend who is sexually devoured somehow, the virgin sacrifice, and finally, the very painfully rendered female hero who exists in a self-conscious reversal of cultural expectations for her sex. She's the one in black leather and a machine gun, pulls out the pin with her teeth. She's probably been sexually abused as in the case of "I Spit on Your Grave." Kind of cool if you can get past that first scene. The rest is a virtual lullaby. And yet, I don't find much in the way of enlightening subject matter, and maybe we're not supposed to have that. But assuming the point of all these movies is to redirect our hearts back to those things that Matter, I'm sure it's meant to be a kind of moral warning that most of us could do without.The tension either grows and subsides or remains at a high level of delirious panic until the sun comes up and our hero limps away while the credits roll. No real payoff. I am not so changed or entertained. Unless it's Killer Klowns from Outer Space, or Troll. They will change your life.

Stories

Many times the horror stories we read are warning to children not to go out after dark, not to steal, rob, cheat, or be false. Death is the ultimate humbling, the revealer of true natures. We are reminded to appreciate what we have in this life because it can be gone in a second and return in a nasty karmic form later. In other words, parables, exploitative of nothing but our own propensity for violence of the spirit. Energy is not created or destroyed, only damaged and pissed off. Don't piss off the ghosts. These are some of my favorite stories for your pleasure:

La Llorona

The Raven

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow













Childhood

My only recurring dream is that it's Halloween night in the neighborhood where I grew up. I've been busy putting my costume together hastily while my mom prepares spaghetti for me to eat before I go out. I eat hurriedly at the dining room table while we listen to our tape of Halloween noises. I have to be careful not to get spaghetti sauce on my costume. I'm starting to hear kids outside, and I'm getting antsy to get out there in the spirit air too. I eat my traditional orange frosting cupcake, and my friends arrive to take me Trick-or-Treating. I run out the door, and the night is not like any other night. Yards are lit up with decorations and shaking things from the trees, there are those shrieking ghosts with the motion sensor, and our doormat howls when you step on it. I think that no other kid feels the presence out here tonight like I do. It's better that they don't. It would scare them, but the spirits comfort me. They know it's my birthday soon, and they're happy to help me celebrate.

When I come home, I have candy dumped out on the carpet for Mom to check, and I watch all the Halloween specials on TV.