A long day's night
Nov. 1st, 2003 09:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wiseheartI went to the cemetery with Mom today. In recent years, we always were brought there by my uncle, but he hates to drive through traffic jams, and Mom wanted to go on All Hallows', so we went by bus and by tram. Took us only about four hours. *sighs*
Actually, I like All Hallows'. When I was a kid, we lived next to the cemetery. There were no lanterns or such there, and in Transylvania you usually had to dug through knee-deep snow on All Hallows' on the 1st of November back then. There was nothing but the black soil, the white snow and thousands of little lights burning on every grave. It was beautiful and mystical and I loved it.
Nowadays one wouldn't risk to go to the cemetery after darkness has falled. Nowadays we don't have snow on All Hallows' anymore. In exchange, Halloween business starts sickering in from the States.
No offense to anyone who's grown up in a different tradition, but I don't like these changes. I want All Hallows' back as I knew it when I was a child.
********
After we came back from the cemetery, we had a two-hour break and then we were taken to my older cousin's place by my uncle. Heidi, the wife of my older cousin, had her birthday yesterday and we celebrated it together with mine... belatedly, in my case, of course.
I hate family reunions. The only thing Mom and I have common with our relatives is the fact that we are related to each other. These get-togethers usually escalate into fights about politics, and I hate those, too. Plus, not having a car ourselves we are dependant on someone of the idiot relatives to take us home, as both my cousins live outside the city.
Surprisingly enough, we lived through the afternoon with a minimum of politics. My aunt, who has Altzheimer, escaped once from the whole bunch and had to be hunted down on the street. They actually managed to give me a birthday gift this year that I won't throw into the dustbin: a set of six long spoons for ice-cream. They are nice.
And my cousin finally finished to copy all my Enya-cassettes, plus the one with the sung tolkien-poems that Finch had recorded me earlier, onto CDs. He had only sat on them for some four months or so. But now I'll have some backup should the cassettes die of over-using. :)
But we still haven't won the jackpot of the lottery. *sighs*
Which means I'll have to face the kids on Monday again.
Actually, I like All Hallows'. When I was a kid, we lived next to the cemetery. There were no lanterns or such there, and in Transylvania you usually had to dug through knee-deep snow on All Hallows' on the 1st of November back then. There was nothing but the black soil, the white snow and thousands of little lights burning on every grave. It was beautiful and mystical and I loved it.
Nowadays one wouldn't risk to go to the cemetery after darkness has falled. Nowadays we don't have snow on All Hallows' anymore. In exchange, Halloween business starts sickering in from the States.
No offense to anyone who's grown up in a different tradition, but I don't like these changes. I want All Hallows' back as I knew it when I was a child.
********
After we came back from the cemetery, we had a two-hour break and then we were taken to my older cousin's place by my uncle. Heidi, the wife of my older cousin, had her birthday yesterday and we celebrated it together with mine... belatedly, in my case, of course.
I hate family reunions. The only thing Mom and I have common with our relatives is the fact that we are related to each other. These get-togethers usually escalate into fights about politics, and I hate those, too. Plus, not having a car ourselves we are dependant on someone of the idiot relatives to take us home, as both my cousins live outside the city.
Surprisingly enough, we lived through the afternoon with a minimum of politics. My aunt, who has Altzheimer, escaped once from the whole bunch and had to be hunted down on the street. They actually managed to give me a birthday gift this year that I won't throw into the dustbin: a set of six long spoons for ice-cream. They are nice.
And my cousin finally finished to copy all my Enya-cassettes, plus the one with the sung tolkien-poems that Finch had recorded me earlier, onto CDs. He had only sat on them for some four months or so. But now I'll have some backup should the cassettes die of over-using. :)
But we still haven't won the jackpot of the lottery. *sighs*
Which means I'll have to face the kids on Monday again.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-01 04:37 pm (UTC)That sounds beautiful. In Britain (I don't know if it also occurs in other places), there's an old folk belief that if you watch at a cemetery gate on All Hallows' Eve, you can see the spirits of the dead pass. :\ Candles burning on snow-covered graves sounds far more healthy and reverent.
Gemma
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-02 09:52 am (UTC)