Wednesday, November 6, 2013

How to die long before Christmas

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford on crass Christmas commercialism and Dia de los Muertos. I've been getting Christmas catalogs since August. Not so much as ONE Dia de los Muertos catalog.

It was 81 degrees outside. It was still early October, not even yet time to set clocks back an hour or pay way too much for a pumpkin in the city. Nearly three months stood like a lump of crushed hopes between that particular moment and Christmas – and yet, there they were, rows of holiday fare awaiting their rotation in the cycle of commercial life, because, well, why the hell not? Does anyone even notice or care anymore? Drug stores churn through this sort of prefab holiday crap like crack anyway, and candy canes have the shelf life of nuclear fuel rods. Might as well just leave them out all year long.
...

It’s almost enough to induce chronic bitterness. It’s almost enough to make you think there’s no other way. There is always another way.

Two days after Halloween, I stood, surrounded by walking skulls and candles, ritual and death, corrected.

It was Dia de los Muertos, of course, swarming through SF’s Mission district like a breath of fresh, funky, coffin-like air, a quirky, morbid, wonderful slap in the face to every American holiday ritual in existence, along with the ruthless machinery of capitalism that define them.

Talk about everything bland, oversold American culture is not – giddy, weird, moribund, playful, creepy, home-spun, solemn, completely noncommercial, no marketing and no major advertising and no noxious commercial jingles, no smarmy Coca Cola ads featuring diabetic polar bears sucking down toxic sugar water and not dying from global warming.

Also: Not a single megastore offering a special Day of the Dead deal on big-screen TVs. No tasteful, sweatshop-made ornaments from Pottery Barn. No special drinks, no immature misinterpretations of Jesus’ birth or death, no reindeer sweaters. It was sort of miraculous.

Instead, Dia de los Meurtos is, to my imperfect understanding, a time to honor the dead, respect your ancestors and pay homage to those loved ones you’ve lost, all during the few days when it’s believed the veil separating the living from the dead is thinnest. There are cacophonous processionals, offerings, marigolds galore (the Aztec flower of death, to which souls are drawn), photos of the deceased everywhere, altars and shrines from sublime to silly, mementos and trinkets and sugar skulls in abundance. It’s sacred, potent, playful, deeply moving. You know, just like Christmas never was.

But it’s also, if I understand it correctly, a day to sort of mock Death itself, that skinny, weak bag o’ bones who couldn’t possibly carry you away right now, and who doesn’t scare you not one bit, even though he totally does.

Is that not refreshing? No wonder American commerce hasn’t swarmed all over this idiosyncratic ritual. Unlike Mexico (and Brazil, Spain, and many others) we haven’t really developed the means to handle death or the afterlife with anything other than fear and denial. Halloween is as close as we get, and that’s become far more about kids gorging on candy and adults gorging on cocktails. The old pagan rituals? The Celtic harvest festivals? Not a clue.
My sentiment exactly. Dia de los Muertos makes more spiritual sense than Halloween, and is a better celebration than almost any of our commercially-driven "holidays".

7 comments:

Deidra said...

"I've been getting Christmas catalogs since August."

Lol, goodness... Dog Bless America. The only thing Xmas means here in Europe is it's a day your employer pays you for staying at home, getting sloshed, eating yourself silly, and fucking like rabbits.

Well, that last bit is mostly the creative ritual initiative of my boyfriend WhyNot - but you'll have to excuse him... he's French, whereas I'm Irish, and therefore never would never contemplate such dreadful anti-christ horrors as copulation or fornication, lol.

Let alone fellatio or cunnilingus... oooh ahhh! My fucking god!!!

You mention "nuclear rods"... do you guys have many nuclear power plants in USA? Other than your "3 miles Island" flagship, I mean, lol. Surely, you must have hunddreds of "working" ones by now.
Here in France they are everywhere. 100 times more nuke power stations than damns or windmills. Near 99% of all electriciy is produced by nuke stations.

Works wonders too, never any power cuts, kWh is 1/3 the price it is in USA, and EDF (the nationalized supplier Co) has hundreds of multi-billion-euro construction projects all over Central and South America, as well as Asia and Africa.

"the ruthless machinery of capitalism that define them."

Wow! I'm impressed, truly. Don't tell me you're marxist too! Goodness... where's USA sinking to, lol. How about Che Guevara? A hero or the ultimate anti-Uncle-Sam villain? Here in Europe, you can buy the world famous "Che poster" in every town of its 27 countries. Beats renditions of Jesus Fucking Christ by about 1 million to one.

Anyway, I like your blog very much; keep it up; cheers!

Gordon said...

I'm not exactly a Marxist, but to our never-right-wing I'm a "godless commie fuck" because I don't toe their line.

We have a lot of nuclear power plants and they're all nearing the end of their service lives.

I loves me an obviously well-educated Irishwoman who can spell fellatio and cunnilingus correctly, but you needn't use such formal language here. :-)

WhyNot said...

"I loves me an obviously well-educated Irishwoman who can spell fellatio and cunnilingus correctly, but you needn't use such formal language here. :-)"

Lolol, yeah she is a gem - the best girlfriend I ever had (not to mention 3 disastrous spouses). But hey, I'm nearly 60, so I figured it was about time I met the right woman in my life. Deidra is a social worker, that's how I met her.

As a rule I found I rather like Irish ppl; although Ireland is a rather northern country (for Europe), they tend to have this southern Europe foul hot temper, lol. But that's made up plenty by their passionate nature when it comes to liking and loving.

"I'm not exactly a Marxist, but to our never-right-wing I'm a "godless commie fuck" because I don't toe their line."

Lol, you don't say! USA's been scared shitless of the spectre of the "red commie doom" for decades. Not so in Europe. Well, obviously when ex USSR decided to start invading Eastern Europe decades ago, it sparked off a multinational outcry right across Europe. it peaked when the tanks rolled into Prague (Chekoslovakia).

But even so, Europeans aren't afraid of socialism or even communism; every EU country as a very strong socialist party and even a significant communist one. In fact, in France the "Parti Socialiste" has for decades been by far the largest of all parties, and nearly every president in the last 30 years has been from the PS. We nearly even had a woman president (Ségolène Royale) from it.

Maybe that's why we have free schooling (including tertiary education - i.e Uni), and free health care which covers everything (from a visit to your local doctor - to heart surgery at the hospital).

Can you imagine that in USA? fuck me dead, where would all the billions in profit of the rip-off private health industry go??? It'd be the end of civilization as we know it, lol!

PS: speaking of Che Guevara: I'm afraid poor Che's figure is such an icon in Europe it is used for purposes I doubt he'd approve. In particular, there is a brand of cigarettes which has his famous black & red portrait on each packet. Sheesh... capitalist fucks would sell porn films of their mothers if it helped their sales.

WhyNot said...

Gordon,

An afterthought, inspired by your "spell fellatio and cunnilingus correctly, but you needn't use such formal language here" remark:

On my now defunct blog, we used to have an unusual visitor, Kristina: very lovely woman in her early 30s, a bit gauche and stilted, but that's because she's very self-conscious of her lack of fluency in EN.

She's Russian, lecturer at uni in Moscow, has 3 PHDs (maths, physics and history), and plays classical piano (with a passion for the romantic era - Chopin, Liszt, Rachmaninov, etc).

Anyway, don't despair, I'm coming to the point, inspired from "cunnilingus":

One day I mentioned something about my enthusiastic pastime of "muff diving". Naturally, although she frantically consulted every dictionary at Uni, Kristina couldn't find the answer to this mysterious Aussie expression. So, she asked. And so, being such a gentleman and a scholar, I explained.

Now for the best part; Here is what she said next:

"Oh I see! Well, I've never been muff-dived into, but I certainly wouldn't mind trying."

Oh my, isn't it priceless? Everyone on the blog was split in 2 with hysterics. Ah, the joys of languages! MUFF-DIVED!!! Methinks the Webster dictionary should add this new expression in their listing!

WhyNot said...

Gordon,

An afterthought, inspired by your "spell fellatio and cunnilingus correctly, but you needn't use such formal language here" remark:

On my now defunct blog, we used to have an unusual visitor, Kristina: very lovely woman in her early 30s, a bit gauche and stilted, but that's because she's very self-conscious of her lack of fluency in EN.

She's Russian, lecturer at uni in Moscow, has 3 PHDs (maths, physics and history), and plays classical piano (with a passion for the romantic era - Chopin, Liszt, Rachmaninov, etc).

Anyway, don't despair, I'm coming to the point, inspired from "cunnilingus":

One day I mentioned something about my enthusiastic pastime of "muff diving". Naturally, although she frantically consulted every dictionary at Uni, Kristina couldn't find the answer to this mysterious Aussie expression. So, she asked. And so, being such a gentleman and a scholar, I explained.

Now for the best part; Here is what she said next:

"Oh I see! Well, I've never been muff-dived into, but I certainly wouldn't mind trying."

Oh my, isn't it priceless? Everyone on the blog was split in 2 with hysterics. Ah, the joys of languages! MUFF-DIVED!!! Methinks the Webster dictionary should add this new expression in their listing!

Gordon said...

"Muff diving" is an American expression too. A friend of mine spent many years as a hardhat deep sea diver. He has a tattoo of a diving helmet and its caption is "mixed gas & muff". ALso, I'm 68 years and another expression is "you may be too old to cut the mustard but you're never too old to lick the jar". ;-)

Yeah, profit kills possibility in a lot of ways. I like the European model on health care (Canadian too) and education. The cost should be borne by all and free to the individual. There's a lot of brain power in less financially fortunate people that will never be developed and we are all the poorer for it.

WhyNot said...

Gordon,

"The cost should be borne by all and free to the individual. There's a lot of brain power in less financially fortunate people that will never be developed and we are all the poorer for it."

You speak of gold, my friend. The weirdest thing is that it is so fuckin' obvious, you'd think anyone with the IQ of Winnie-the-Pooh would grasp it instantly. Alas... not so at all.

"you may be too old to cut the mustard but you're never too old to lick the jar"

Lolol, very nice! Extremely suave and classy! Spoken like a true blue Aussie, lol. You ever been down under?