Welcome, welcome, welcome! The ferryman didn’t talk your ear off during the passage, did he? Quickly now, come inside, please—you’ll catch your death out here… and by the sound of it, the wolves are close tonight. Be careful—watch your step… oh! and I just remembered: nobody has an open wound, I hope? A young man on the last tour had a cut on the back of his hand that aggravated the… the… and now he’s… well, in any case, best keep your hands to yourself.
This is a final reminder that the tour is not recommended for individuals who have been cursed, hexed, or hoodwinked; we recommend consulting a qualified occult practitioner before entering.
As you venture through our little house of horrors, try to ignore anything you spy from the corner of your eye. You never know what might be lurking behind the drapes; in the closet; or under the bed. Best not to look. Besides, I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about. All of our monsters are very well-fed! Of course, for the sake of your sanity, please ignore the sound of clinking chains, gnashing teeth, and grinding bones. Oh, and one last thing: absolutely no. wandering. off. Now, follow me, if you dare… we’ll begin the tour in the crypt—the second door on your left… that’s right, the one with all the spiderwebs. If you’ve brought a spare flashlight, you’ll want to keep it handy, although… you can never seem to trust those things around here…
I love Hallowe’en. It has an undeniable vibe. The weather gets chilly enough to send shivers down your spine. The days draw ever-shorter and darkness predominates. Leaves, the most obvious indication of nature’s vivacity, shrivel and fall, wholly remaking the landscape. With the harvest complete and winter on its way, it’s no wonder that our ancestors noticed and ascribed significance to the shifting of the seasons. When we were far less technically developed and at nature’s indifferent mercy, fall’s association with death and darkness must have felt even more palpable.
Still, if Hallowe’en makes us somewhat uneasy, it’s probably due to its liminality, existing as it does as a kind of threshold between summer and winter. Historically, such liminality was believed to indicate that the threshold between this world, and that of the dead, had become permeable, or at least more so than at other times of the year. So, a cause for reverance but also for vigilance. Whether called Hallowe’en, the festival of Samhain, or All Hallows’ Eve, autumnal celebrations have long been used to honour and remember the dead (and even to exorcise wayward spirits), as well as to acknowledge our undeniable mortality.
Of course, crass commercialism and excessive alcohol consumption have excised much of the reverance of the past from our celebrations today but I still find the continuity of “Hallowe’en” impressive. In a way, if you watch a scary movie, or get dressed up, or go trick-or-treating, you’re carrying on an ancient legacy. You’re facilitating the perpetuation of a long-standing tradition that has continued to survive and evolve for well over a thousand years.
And I think that’s pretty rad.
But we haven’t lost everything. If you think about it, much of Hallowe’en is still about fear and death.
Trick-or-treating—and it’s grown-up variation, “getting shit-faced”—is a performative act of death denial. A collective ritual wherein we shed our frail individualism and allow it to be supplanted by our symbolic inclusion in a group far greater than ourselves. It provides the illusion of immorality we all long for. During an evening of revelry, we can forget that most terrible of truths: we’re all gonna die someday.
Whether we want to admit it or not, nothing scares us quite like that.
Hallowe’en offers us the opportunity to engage with fear in a codified, ritualized environment. It keeps us safe while we flirt with danger. It’s a much needed pressure valve that allows us to probe the deepest, darkest corners of our minds and not become lost or ostrascized.
Hallowe’en is necessary, I’ve come to believe. It’s a celebration of fear, and as such, it plays an important role in normalizing fear in our culture. It’s normal to be afraid—okay, even. We need encouragement and bravery to face our fears, but these are difficult to conjure on our own. It’s almost like we need to establish an ethic of fear. Because if we can’t talk about the things we fear, if we must suppress the things that keep us up at night, or consider our fears disdainfully primitive and primordial, unfit for conversation amidst polite company, we risk becoming monsters ourselves.
Fear can be a menace, if left unchecked. Without fear, we wouldn’t have had Aushwitz, the Inquisition, or bad face lifts. Fear can destroy. But only if it can’t be managed. Because fear can also be a great teacher, a catalyst for change.
See, that’s the thing about fear, it’s whatever you make it…
By the way, to celebrate Hallowe’en, I’m posting a new bonus reading each day for paid subscribers of unspooling. So far, I’ve read a few scary folktales collected by the legendary Alvin Schwartz—I even do little voices and everything. So, if you find unspooling valuable, and can afford to do so, please consider supporting the show financially. Otherwise, I’ll have to send the cats to work at the mill. It’s dangerous work but I think they’re nimble enough to do it…
Be well, everyone.
- c.d.