All Souls Day

According to Clement Miles, (c. 1912) the season of All Hallow Tide was still reckoned to be the beginning of Christmas during the reign of Charles I. It is the beginning of the advent journey in to the season of deepest darkness.

During the past year, Joe and I have grown close to our little neighbor Ryan. In love with tractors, Ryan like to come down and sit on Joe's tractor. He comes every day and would come even more if he was allowed to. (His father has explained that tractors actually need to sleep quite a bit, just like little boys, and if the door to the shed is closed it means that the tractors are sleeping.) I'm told that from time to time Ryan gives heartfelt expressions to his feelings, telling his mother that "Mr. Joe is nice".

Ryan and his older brother Jake came down yesterday evening to see our pumpkins. In years past, we have always lit a Jack O' Lantern on a large boulder in the river that runs past our house, but this year it rained on Halloween. But on the eve of All Souls Day, the moon was full and the air was crisp, so the boys came down to see the pumpkins. Mr. Joe got home last after sunset, and we all made our way down the lane to the bridge. Joe led the way to the river, carrying his own lantern. Ranger the dog led the way. I brought up the rear, carrying a large Jack O' Lantern. The moon lit the path for our little procession. How lovely and peaceful it was. Between the two of us, Joe and I have lived more than a century, but Ryan and Jake can still count the years on their fingers.

I thought "one day Joe and I will be a child's happy memory". On the eve of All Souls day when we remember our ancestors, I looked in to the future, to that time when I would be a memory.

At the bridge, Joe walked down the precarious path to the water and set the pumpkin in place. Jake wanted to go with him, but his mother thought he would be better off watching. Joe told him he could hold the lantern. The dog stood in the glow of the lantern, shepherding everyone. A small child holding a lantern with a faithful dog at his side. The full moon on the water. The shout of triumph as the pumpkin king came to light over the water. A wish when Jake saw the first star.

I thought of distant ancestors, whose names were long forgotten, but whose features are still familiar, our own faces living portraits of the ones who went before. I thought of them walking to a new place, and settling in, deciding to light the fire of summer's end at the base of a particular rock. The children who came afterwards lit their fires there too, because in their lifetime it had always been so. After a generation or so, people who could no longer remember who lit the first fire beside the standing stone, lit their own because the spirits told them to. Lives fade in to memory, memories fade in to spirit.

Perhaps one day Jake will take his family to see the place where he grew up. Perhaps he will tell her about the nice old couple who lit a Jack O' Lantern on the rocks each year. Perhaps Ryan will set a lantern on a rock in a river one day, not quite sure where the idea came from.