Catrina is the skeletal feminine figure that presides over Dia de los Muertos, and this young woman was getting into the spirit of the holiday. She is not, as several people observed, all that "skeletal" herself, but she's got the traditional hand-on-the-hip Catrina pose down pat.

The official observation is on November 2. It falls on Monday this year, and we will be celebrating with neighbors and friends at the formal opening of Xaltemba Restaurant and Gallery. But last night Larry and I, and houseguest Patricia, strolled up and down the main Avenida, taking in the altars built by local high school students to honor members of the community who had made a difference in their lives. There was an altar to a former math teacher, and several to grandfathers and grandmothers, those altars readily apparent by the presence of a rocking chair waiting to rest their weary spirits.





It's at this time of year that supposedly the dead come back to call on those they've left behind, and they're greeted with ofrendas or offerings of things significant in their lives -- favorite foods, treasured mementos, symbols of activities they enjoyed, or symbols of their employment. The woman honored by this altar was a hair dresser, so you see her salon chair, a hair styling magazine and other tools of her trade -- all ready for her return.






The majority of the altars honored young people -- friends, classmates, or older brothers or sisters of the students' contemporaries. You see a date like the one in the picture, look at the young face framed by a sunset over the ocean, and catch your breath. Not even twenty years old! Obviously Alejandro, another nineteen-year old, was someone who loved the water, and his friends decorated his altar with lots of beach sand, and even provided a skim board for playing in the waves. (Remember, you can click on any image here and make it bigger. Then just hit the back arrow to return to the text.)




Do people really believe the spirits come back and visit? Talking with our Mexican friends, and with the young people busily constructing the altars that afternoon, I get the impression that these memorials are more a means for keeping those who have passed on alive in memory rather than a serious accomodation for the departed returning in some kind of not-so-concrete form. What is very tangible though, is the sense of reverence and remembrance for the person being considered -- a public acknowledgement of his or her value and contribution to the fabric of community life. I like it that high school kids have an opportunity to come together, build something around a friend's memory, get dressed up, read aloud a tribute, and have people applaud afterwards. That's the kind of validation every teenager could use.

Essential to every altar are four elements:

• An image of the person honored
• candles for light and aroma
• fresh flowers to remind us of the impermanence of physical life no matter how beautiful it seems
• water to symbolize purity and renewal

I don't believe in spirits other than the sense we carry around of who someone was. Goodness, that could apply to those whose warm skin we can still touch! It's our own sense of who our mother or dad was -- or is -- that may affect the way we conduct ourselves now. My mom lives in Lubbock, Texas, but I swear she spends a lot of time inside my head. There are ghosts to deal with, living or dead. If building an altar and revising our mortal history can expunge a few hurts and misunderstandings, I say, "lift those altars high!" Let's honor the good and let go of the not so good. That way Dia de Los Muertos becomes a celebration of life, the way it was meant to be!