Creative Calamities

I have heard about the Feast of Samhain for years (pronounced Sahween) from a single person. There is a long history of this Celtic tradition of which I don’t know the details but I am sure I have been told.

Every year as Halloween nears a good friend of mine, the Scottish born, John Cornell talks of his favorite holiday of the year.

He prides himself on being dubbed an “emotional zero” but every year on Halloween he makes sure to be home with glowing carved pumpkins on his stoop and  a large pot of candy for the costumed children revelers that come calling for candy .

This year I had the pleasure of sharing in his Halloween’s Eve pumpkin carving ritual, of which he states without his ritual, Halloween would not come.

The evening at his home felt more like a Christmas Eve than a Halloween’s Eve. A few friends gathered and watched the master carve pumpkins while keeping warm in front of his glowing wood burning stove. He did not sketch a face on the pumpkin and he did not use a fancy pumpkin carving tool, just a large pointed knife with which he carved pumpkin after pumpkin. Watching him was like being at a ‘happening’ in the 60s. It was performance art at it’s best. A few cuts here and a few slices there and his pumpkins came to life in the cool autumn air.