Six Weeks
of Weird Halloween Words ~ Week #1
“Christmas” is preceded by “Hallowmas”?
HALLOWMAS (halʹō mɘs, -masʹ) n. former name for All
Saints’ Day. [Think celebrating sainted spirits …if you lived through the night
before hell.]
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| Painting by Guido di Pietro, 15th century. |
How former, you ask? It
reaches back to somewhere between 731-741. And of course, All Saints’ Day is November 1, to honor … well … all saints.
[Clever.]
Want
to get in the mood? Melanie Rigney’s new book, Blessed Are You: Finding Inspiration from the Stories of the Women Saints is
especially appropriate; religious or not, Catholic or not, there is excellent
life advice to be gleaned from it.
How
does Hallowmas make the Weird Halloween Words list? It’s preceded
by All Hallow’s Eve (Halloween) on October 31, a night on which the
veil between us and the afterlife is particularly thin.
Of course, we don masks
so the menacing souls on “the other side,” won’t recognize us, as we feast in preparation
for the next two celebratory days. Seriously – they won’t know it’s you under
that Star Wars: the Force Awakens
Kylo Ren helmet-head, or traditionally
sexy Bat Girl mask. And then what happens ...?
