Comments on: calaveras & candles

By: natalya

natalya — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 07:38:48 +0000

there is a beautiful, enormous event in Tucson where i live called the All Souls Procession….over 15,000 people of all ages, cultures, etc parade through the streets in costumes, with altars, candles, etc, and place their prayers into a giant urn. there is a culminating finale – a public ritual/performance and the urn gets lifted high into the air and burned.

it is one of the most incredible and powerful community experiences i have ever had the honor to be a part of.

By: Maryah

Maryah — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 23:52:31 +0000

Each year, since I discovered sugar skulls and my incredible attraction to them, my spouse and I have held a potluck for Day of the Dead (dia de los muertos) we decorate sugar cookies and decorate sugar skulls in memory of / celebration of our loved ones.
North America is vvery unlike othe rplaces on earth in the way we treat death as a business and leave the bodies of our loved ones to be dealt with by ‘professionals’ , and while our way seems to be the way that many ‘westernized’ countries are following I think our death procedures are cold, sterile and leave those left behind scared and alone feeling entirely disconnected from one they used to share a close connection with. Perhaps this is why I have latched on to this day with such tenacity. I want to the connection with those that are no longer physically here and I feel as though something was denied me in the way their deaths have been treated.
How brave of you to mourn your miscarriage so publicly. I think all potential mothers who ‘lose’ children should have the freedom to do so. I truly believe that this life is only but a stop on our journey and that children who did not make it to this life will see us in another.

By: Elizabeth

Elizabeth — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 00:43:18 +0000

I have been to a few Dia de los Muertos celebrations/rituals but don’t really do any of my own. Or rather, I haven’t in recent years. As time travels onward and I lose loved ones, I do feel more drawn to this – and more especially since Autum/Winter is my favorite time of the year, it all seems so fitting. I lost someone very special to me last July and I think I will honor and remember them this year with a ritual.

I’m sorry to read about your friend. New Orleans. Sigh. I miss it but many things about it I do not. I’ve been told New Orleans is considered a “Scorpio” city and the intensity of living there crests and ebbs accordingly. I was also told that while many wonderful things could happen for you there, you would always pay somehow “in blood.”

Lovely post and lovely images for a rather somber subject, but somehow it still inspires!

By: Automne

Automne — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 23:24:12 +0000

Beautiful post. I didn’t know Kirsten personally but she was dating our friend John at the time. We were absolutely sickened when we heard what happened to her. She seemed like such a wonderful person – always fighting the good fight.

By: nath

nath — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 22:05:59 +0000

oh! reading this was like an icicle to the heart. your friend sounded incredible, how lucky you were to have known her but how terrible and tragic and wrong to lose her, i’m so sad for you.

that dress you wore was beautiful and honest and brave. as ever, there’s beauty and darkness everywhere.