It’s time for another blog about Samhain. What’s it going to be this time? Another mussing on the importance of the ancestors? Maybe I should talk about how the veil is thin? Maybe I can talk about how this is the end of the harvest cycle and what that means for the coming darkness. I’ve done all those things, and so have a lot of other people.
Coming up with something new to say about a holiday that has been celebrated by pagans for thousands of years isn’t easy. And we’re in the middle of a pandemic where all of us are stuck in one way or another. Whether we’re working from home where the days are bleeding together in an endless stream that feels stultifying, or you’re an “essential employee” who must continue to risk themselves in order to maintain others’ expectations and comfort, or someone who’s lost their job and is struggling to keep a roof over their head and food in the bellies of themselves and their family. We are all of us stuck in one way or another.
And so here we are, frightened, lonely, battered and bruised, trapped, and above all else, exhausted. For so many months we’ve been holding on. And it feels like any moment we might lose our grip.
What does Samhain have to teach us at this moment?
It is a mistake to believe that just because Samhain is when we can speak to our ancestors that it is a holiday about…
