Have a Happy and Psychotic Halloween

OH we are odd…. So very odd. 

When I was in 8th grade Spanish class I learned of a holiday in Mexico called “Dia de Los Muertos” (translation:  Day of the Dead).  Our teacher showed us pictures and told us about some of the traditions that happen in this holiday such as people go visit and show respect for lost loved ones in the cemetery by bringing flowers, having food celebrations, and decorating the streets with colorful skeletons and other representative decoration of the deceased.    Naturally as a bunch of 8^th graders we kind of poked fun, thought it was weird that they “celebrated” their dead. 

Being of Hispanic decent I remember that day going home and asking my mom more about the holiday, she explained to me it typically had more to do with the Catholic culture (which is the predominant culture there) but it was more like Memorial Day.  Of course here in America we don’t typically throw as big or elaborate of a celebration for our deceased loved ones and those past who have served us, other than have the day off for a barbeque.

Coincidentally Dia de Los Muertos falls relatively close to Halloween.  Considering that Halloween may have a relative root from the traditional Mexican holiday, Dia de Los Muertos has a clear purpose, which I have difficulty in seeing what purpose Halloween has. 

If you are driving north on I-15 in Salt Lake City and about 6^th South on the right there is a demon-ish figure dangling a couple of presumably fake people representing an obviously terrifying experience and in the same proximity there are graffiti paintings on a creepy old mill depicting 666 and other disturbing material with fake gory detailing.  Passing this same scene while on my home with my best friend, he made an interesting and amusing comment.  Imagine you came to this country without any prior knowledge to what Halloween is about. Now, imagine what your impression would be to see the advertised scene like the one described above.  I personally would find it very odd to see a demon on the side of the freeway dangling an innocent looking human, if I was a child… I’d probably be pretty disturbed.  One day I would actually like to personally talk to someone who has had this experience to find out what they actually thought.  

Halloween is definitely a unique holiday.  No one who celebrates it seems to know for sure of the actual reason why it is such a big deal around here.  Alright, so you have free candy everywhere, you get to dress up for whatever you’d like to be, and by that you can go to any celebration as someone you’re not.  Some don’t even limit dressing up for just a party, they can go about anywhere as a flapper girl and people think it’s the norm because of Halloween.  For a lot of people, including me at times, we call this fun.  We like the thrill of paying people to scare us, to intentionally watch something that may just give us nightmares or traumatize us from walking around in our basements by ourselves, and we like the excuse to celebrate in this bizarre way.  It comes as a treat to us every year as people prep their haunted houses, corn mazes, pumpkin fields and million dollar movies for months.  Well the trick is, why?

Trick or treat?  Is that what it is all about.  Treats are good, but quite frankly we can get them for almost any holiday Halloween just adding to the list (4^th of July, Easter, Christmas, etc.)  Tricks can be fun, I guess.  You walk into a haunted house and people try to “trick” you into thinking they’re a serial killer.  I want to go deeper than that, though.  Historically I’m sure there is some backing to this unique holiday, but I have some theories on how this “holiday” has escalated so much over time.  In general this world typically goes for bigger, better, and faster and tucks away any sort of decline.  This can be pretty stressful.  So in result we want a release.  Once a year we give ourselves an opportunity to make it socially acceptable to go mad, crazy, and unreal. 

Obviously we don’t typically try to go completely psychotic, it’s not like we use this time to create complete chaos, however we observe it.  Some of us watch gruesome movies where someone’s world is ending, put up eerie decorations in front of our houses to encourage fear in the hearts of children coming to your door, dress our kids up as either monsters or cute bunnies in which any other sense would never dwell together, and go to places where the images, and costumed people might make us embarrassed when we scream, wet ourselves, leave grip marks on friends’ arms, run in fear, cry, etc. 

If we were a complete outsider watching these behaviors emerge and then go away after the end of a month, it would be like watching this psychotic phase where a collective group of people endorse evil scenarios and resort to celebrating an alternate reality of actually desiring to be mentally harmed and having our teeth rot. 

But on the inside; Halloween is normal, many participate, some don’t, it’s kind of whatever to us now.  Collecting this all in my own mind, I laugh at my eighth grade Spanish class that laughed and ridiculed Dia de Los Muertos. At least Dia de Los Muertos has a true purpose a respectable reason to celebrate.  Unlike Halloween who only really proves to be a reason to celebrate unusualness, disobedience to the social norm, being scared, escaping reality, and arbitrary fun.  Yep, us Americans and those that celebrate Halloween…. We are pretty odd.