2008 Dia de los Muertos

This year Mom, Jeff and Devon (wearing a stylin' hat), Sydney and Logan joined me to celebrate Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead)  at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.  We started at my house and made our own alter honoring our loved ones and friends that have passed on.  I explained the alters, the holiday traditions and what to expect so hopefully they wouldn't be afraid of anything they saw and to understand that this is intended to be a joyous celebration.  Oh, and we ate minicupcakes to celebrated Jeff's birthday.

Photograph were difficult to take.  It was pitch black so you never really quite knew if you had anything framed well and it was crowded!  Almost impossible to get pictures without strangers standing in them.  

This was one of the performance stages set over a lake.  It was really beautiful.  On the side of the building they were projecting colored light patterns that looked like the paper cutouts that they use on the alters to represent wind.  At the end of this post I've added a video of a performance at this stage to give a little  sense of scale.

This is one of two 15-20 foot skeletons that stand guard over the door to the mausoleum.

I love this picture.  It's one of two skeletons that are sitting in boats on the lake.  On the right are groups of candles that also are floating along but in this picture they've already burnt out.  When lit they add a beautiful effect.

More papermache figures, however Logan, Devon and Sydney are very real.  Below is a video of some of the dance performances.

Calacas Attire

I

You're encouraged to come in Calacas (skeleton) attire.  We all agreed that next year (always next year) we want to participate in the calacas.  The picture above is of one of the dancers.  I loved the shot I ended up getting for several reasons but the biggest being that it's so dark and there are so many people that I just blindly held my camera up and shot.  This was one where I actually liked what I got.  

These ladies looked amazing and I'm not sure the pictures do them justice.  This is the view from behind and in front.

The Alters

These pictures are a little misleading.  It's totally dark out there.  Most times you're not even sure if you have the picture framed correctly if at all.  So this is Jeff, Mom, me, Logan, Sydney and Devon at the cemetery.  When it was all over I asked Devon what she thought of it and if she'd come again.  Her response?  "Maybe next year in the daytime"... we'll see next year now, won't we?

This One's for Jeremy and Kristy

This is the alter for Johnny Ramone who (obviously) is buried here.

I liked this picture because the lighting made it look like this skeleton royalty is holding this man's head.

They try to discourage Halloween attire in an effort to try to separate these two holidays but it's really inevitable that Halloween will creep in, especially when it's just the night before.  I thought this was cute so I included it.

Me, a Nazi?

I sent this to Letters to the Editor at the Signal after this happened last night.

I am pro Proposition 8. I believe very strongly that marriage is a time-honored and socially critical covenant between a man and a woman with the chief purpose of conceiving and raising children in a loving family environment, a covenant that has been gradually eroded and made to seem wholly irrelevant (till now) over the last 40+ years. I live on a busy street in my tract and have had 4 signs stolen from my front yard in 2 weeks. Many of my friends have had theirs stolen too. One house in my otherwise peaceful neighborhood was vandalized. I came home late this evening to surprise a young man posting a swastika and a lengthy accusation on the streetlight in front of my house accusing “Yes On 8” people of being hate-filled Nazi's. Being of German descent I guess I should have been outraged at this, but I spoke cordially with him for a while to let him explain his beliefs and figure out why he picked my house. He eventually admitted it was because of the “Yes On 8” sign on my lawn and he wanted to make a statement specifically towards me. If he had painted the very same message on my garage door it would have been a hate crime. I'm very concerned. This has become a common response by Prop 8 opponents. Slander and hate-filled accusations from the same group that tells us we should be more open-minded and accepting of those different from us. This is scary moral relativism in a most unsubtle form. Apparently in their minds any means seems to justify the ends, including vulgarity, slander and intimidation. Perhaps naively I left his paper alone hoping the contrasting displays may move those still thinking about it to carefully consider the means and methods of Proposition 8 opponents and where such justification could take us in the future.