Ghosts . . . and Spirits

Everybody loves holidays. Part of their appeal is the wonderful variety of things we get to celebrate and the many different ways we can observe the occasions. There are the religious holidays – Christmas, Yom Kippur, Easter, Hanukkah – with their pageantry and solemnity. There are the patriotic days, like July 4, with parades and fireworks. And then there are days for remembering heroes like Martin Luther King and our great Presidents. There are others, too, for celebrating various people and events in history, for giving thanks and for remembering those who have fallen in wars.

But this month’s holiday is strictly for FUN. Technically, of course, it’s not really a holiday at all. No one gets a day off from work or school, banks and post offices aren’t closed and bus schedules aren’t affected. But it’s a day for parties and costumes, a day for scaring people and most of all, a day of make-believe. Spooks and skeletons, ghosts and goblins, spiders and specters haunt our neighborhoods on October 31, frightening the very young and delighting the more mature who recognize the absurdity of it all. All the pretend creatures can indeed throw fear into a three-year-old, but as we grow older, the ogres lose their power to terrify as we acknowledge that ghosts are, in fact, imaginary and unreal.

Yet, even for some of us older adults, some ghosts continue to haunt us. These ghosts have names like “should have,” “if only,” “wish I’d said” and “why did I?” And they are not simply ghosts of the past but also ghosts of the present and even the future. They have names like “I may lose my job,” and “what will I do if . . .?” Like shadowy specters, they follow us until we look them in the eye and say, “You’re not real; you’re a product of my imagination; you can’t hurt me because you’re not alive.” Then, once rid of them, we can concentrate on what is real.

So what can adults learn from Halloween? We can learn that by facing our ghosts, unmasking them and seeing them as unreal and imaginary, they can no longer threaten us. We can learn to laugh at the would-be goblins in our lives and concentrate instead on real, living manifestations of the supernatural. To do this, we can cultivate those counterparts of ghosts, which we know as spirits. Spirits are ephemeral, mysterious, invisible beings that bring only goodness. Unlike ghosts, they are very real. Their names are too numerous to mention, but we know some of them as kindness, cooperation, charity, loyalty, truth and love. Where such spirits abound, no fear of ghosts can endure.

So let’s all have some Halloween fun. Let’s enjoy the magic, the elves and fairies, the tricks and treats, and even the ghosts and goblins. But never forget that it’s all make-believe. What’s really alive and well are the spirits that make us human.

Olive Tiller is a resident of Sherwood Oaks Retirement Community.