Living My Dreams the Way I Ought To

Well, it’s that time of year again.

Hallowe’en? That’s amateur hour. Stephen King stuff. I’m talkin’ serious business. The Hanal Pixan is happening in Merida, and it truly is a happening.

Hanal Pixan is different from the Day of the Dead celebrations in other parts of Mexico. It’s Mayan. It translates roughly to “food of the souls,” or maybe “meal for the dead.” Unlike Hallowe’en, it lasts for three days, from October 31st to November 2nd. The first day is in honor of angelitos, i.e.: children who died. November 1st is for adults who bought the farm. November 2nd is for families to visit cemeteries to clean and decorate graves. They’re all excuses for fiestas and parades.

It’s getting about as out of hand as Hallowe’en in the US. They’ve had big ofrendas (altars) set up all over town for days now, and the celebrations have jumped the gun already.

To someone raised Catholic, it seems pretty familiar. Hallowe’en was cadge-candy eve. November 1st was All Saints Day, when you prayed for people who didn’t need it, because they were gorging on manna in heaven already. If Heaven was the mafia, they were the capo regimes. November 2nd was All Souls Day, when you were supposed to pray for people who missed their connecting flight to Heaven, and were stuck in Purgatory. Unbaptized infants would be included in that, so it’s basically angelitos, plus other pious but heathen folks the pope could stand.

I came at it from the Irish angle. I think we were supposed to carve rutabagas, not pumpkins, because pumpkins in Ireland were scarcer than good government in Boston. Anyway, the Druids or whatever heathens the monks found in Hibernia to convert (or else) adopted the Catholic rites. The priests looked the other way and allowed most of the traditional pagan hijinks to go on, but called them something else. Hanan Pixan sounds just like it to my ear. Yeah, padre, we’re [cough cough] Catholics now! We’re going to paint skulls on our faces and march down the street and eat Death Bread to, you know, honor the saints or something. Whatever you got.

So the legions of Las Catrinas will march and dance, and we’ll watch them do it.

And we’ll be home in time for All Saints Day, which ain’t half bad, either. They don’t have Guinness in Mexico, but I’ve got some in my fridge back home.

Follow the lead, it is no wonder, I seem to be so high
Living my dreams the way I ought to
As the days go rolling by