RainRainWentToday, NextTimePleaseALongerStay

It's Requiem for a Dream playing on Pandora (Clint Mansell/Kronos Quartet) along with blessed other movie soundtracks on GLADiator RADio, OS outside finally settling on one-color-or-the-other for the front of the house since the sun came out, but not before beating his eldest Sis' at a rainy morning game of chess. I could pretend it was a their idea, but that would be untrue: after listening to Glad-Rad all day yesterday, it became glaringly apparent that when it's gloomy & wet, one's chess board must be put to use, or what's a rainy day for? Pawns & bishops dusted off, table cleared, it wasn't hard to sell the plan. Soggy leaves dot the wood floors, added a woodsy touch.


Middle Chyle. She's out with her church kids, climbing Mount Baldy. (She will not track in a single leaf. That's just who she is.)


Mr. Man. Off driving go-carts with team members from work, but will walk in at any moment (he WILL track in more glorious leaves), hence, I must be brief in the interest of beating him to the kitchen where chicken thighs are thawing.  We're locked in a game of 'cooking wars.' I am not really interested in winning, but I am certain that he iS, so today shall be my turn.


Wait. Yesterday's laundry, still unfolded. The morning was spent penning a letter, talking on the phone, HELL talking (theology, not trash) with eldestD,  and reading an old Will Glasser blog. On THIS very day, eight yrs ago, he wrote the item below.  It exactly declares my usual position on Halloween, but I've 'acclimated to the culture'; moved left of right. You kinda hafta' when the house next door is a The Coney Island of Halloweeness. Would that I could post a picture.  I've come to adore what I once abhorred.


Mr. Glasser's now married and living in SO-CA, yet a little too far away and too clean to give a call to D#1, his fellow classmate who is a slightly bohemianized variation from the PHC ideal.


I salute him anyway:

"WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2002

October 31st: Reformation vs. Halloween by Will Glasser.blogspot.com

On October 31, 1517, a monk stood at the door of a church in Wittenberg, Germany. With several strokes from a hammer in his hand, he nailed a piece of parchment to the wooden door. The parchment bore ninety-five statements condemning the corruption of the Roman Catholic Church. The man was Martin Luther, and the ninety-five theses that he posted on that October day set into action a movement that would change the course of history - the Protestant Reformation.

Sadly, Christians today do not associate October 31st with Luther's brave action. Instead, the day is spent in celebration of a pagan festival of death and darkness. Reformation Day has been overshadowed by Halloween.

The roots of Halloween can be traced back more than fifteen hundred years before Luther's time to the Celtic festival Samhain. This festival was celebrated on October 31st, the eve of the Celt's New Year, to honor their lord of death, Samhain. On this evening, the Celtic pagan priests, called Druids, built huge bonfires, on which they sacrificed crops and animals. The people would array themselves in ghoulish costumes and parade around the neighborhood to frighten off spirits... "

(Funny. I was just perusing the blog of Jim Morrison's wife,  "Mrs. Morrison's Hotel," who celebrates her Wiccan priestessness, wishing her readers a Happy Samhain. [D#1, how do you pronouce that, again?) Good thing for all of us she doesn't take comments. I doubt she wants me asking if she's really a priestess of death. Jim is a little beyond caring, at this point.)

I wrote a near identical Halloween Hellow to give away with the candy some eight years ago, too. [OMG. Did I steal it from him? can't remember back that far...] The hope --beyond redeeming the night-- was that some like minded family would see our info, call, and invite us to a neighborhood Bible Study. I'm starting to figure out that is never going to happen.  All these years, I've considered our house too small, but I hear the LORD lately saying OhPooh. You don't need a big house to worship Me. Just do it.  What a concept. (Does Jesus say Pooh or Pshaw? Such a deep day of Theological Thinking.)  So...

...if I can demand my children PLAY CHESS already, why not hypnotically propose that DH hold a Bible Study already?

It's complicated.