The
cardboard spider was splendid indeed. Halloween and Christmas are the two
festivals that promote decorating the house, so maybe that’s why they are my
favourites. The sparkles, lights in trees and candles in pumpkins, caught my
imagination early. Actually, as children, we were given turnips to carve,
pumpkins were too exotic for our household. For safety, we carved with spoons
not knives. Carving a turnip with a blunt spoon is not easy, but the end result
was proportionately satisfying.
‘Halloween
1991
Put
our decs up and partied. I made a black and orange spider, out of cardboard, to
match our streamers. Flat looks funky. Inflatable flashing spook is a big success.
Daughter extroverted as ever, chasing guests with an egg box dragon. She
decided to wear a green hat, rose patterned gypsy dress and a fluorescent beach
bag. Went to bed happily too. I think parties are natural environments for her.
Lots of people around, lots of drink to go round and I made pigs liver pate,
pepperoni pizza, baked potatoes, sausages, crisps and sweeties for our party
tea.
Next
morning.
Tired
but not ill. Tidied up by 10am but it’s still smoky in here. Making post
Halloween bash hash for tea and have plenty of college work to do! I love
festivals. They keep you in touch with the world, seasons and life as an
ongoing process, all cyclical and sparkly.’
Smoking indoors!!!!!!!!!! OMG. I almost cut out this sentence, for
shame, and then I remembered the flat next door. One set of our new neighbours
was a retired bus driver and his wife, they were both heavy smokers and had
heavy emphysema.
Also, they had a teaspoon collection, which
they kindly invited me to view. Displayed in a wall mounted wood and glass
unit, these commemorative spoons were mostly sent to them by other people, as
the couple were too ill to travel much. I don’t want to promote smoking but
neither can I claim that I’ve never done it; it was a night-time comfort routine
for me, a moment of pausing before sleep. The teaspoon collection helped curb
the habit.
The
other important thing here, beyond the cultural shock of indoor smoking and
back to the map of finding happiness, is that we like to celebrate, we pay
attention to the moment. My reason for loving festivals holds fast, that was a
habit worth cultivating.
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