“Secrets are safe, and they do much to make you different on the inside, where it counts.” This is the advice given by the title character of E. L. Konigsburg’s novel From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler to the child protagonists. That was back in 1967, a more innocent time than our own; had Konigsburg been writing in 2015, she probably would have worded Mrs. Frankweiler’s message a little differently. But the message itself remains an important one. No, children should never be expected to keep secrets, but they might be encouraged to collect them, which is why this year’s “All One Family” series of articles is all about secrets.
By secret, I’m don’t mean confidences or skeletons in the closet but those forgotten bits of history and hidden knowledge that lie everywhere around us. I like to think of them as the Everyday Arcane. “Everyday” because they touch us on a daily basis; “Arcane” because so few are clued in to these little treasures. Remember how “in the know” you felt when you found out that the old children’s song and dance “Ring Around the Rosy” was a mini-reenactment of the Black Plague? And here’s a fun one to share at the kids’ table at Thanksgiving: in early America, even very young children would have been drinking hard cider along with the grown-ups. In fact, until quite recently, children drank wine, beer, and mead because they were safer than milk, which couldn’t be refrigerated, or water, which was often contaminated. (And no, I don’t actually serve alcohol at the kids’ table!)
Why bother with such “trivia,” as some would call it? The answer, as your history teacher probably told you, is because the past informs the present: the more you know about the one, the better chance you have of understanding the other. Besides, it’s fun. Few of us are born with exceptional artistic or athletic abilities, and even fewer with genuine psychic gifts. How many of you reading this almanac have magic crackling from the tips of your fingers? Not so many, I would guess. The collecting of secrets requires no special abilities, just a sense of curiosity and a determination to dig below the surface, to peek behind the curtain, to challenge that which everyone else takes for granted. Yes, we will be delving into the dark side. Wicca is largely about recognizing and paying tribute to the dead, especially at Samhain, and there’s no reason to leave the children behind. Because we want to get the kids involved, I’ll be focusing on those secrets embedded in the culture of childhood. But remember: you’re never too old to become a collector of secrets.
So what secret have I saved for Samhain? I know what you’re thinking: “Now she’s going to tell us that jack-o’-lanterns used to be carved from turnips.” Don’t worry; I have something much better, though a little less cheerful. Here goes: Everybody dies. Oh, so you already knew that? That’s because you’re a grown-up. If you have children, then you have an especially painful awareness of this truth, but if you’re a child, this may be news to you. I am now, for the second time around, the mother of a nine-year-old and I regularly have other nine-year-olds in my car. This is the time when you want to start turning the radio down when you drive so you can hear what’s being said in the back seat. I do, and let me tell you, these kids are obsessed with death.
Why? I think it’s because, at this age, they’re just coming to believe in their own mortality. By now, most of them have experienced the loss of someone close to them, human or animal. Death has become relevant, and yet it is like nothing else in their world. They’ve learned that pretty much anything that breaks can be replaced, that even broken bones heal, that books can be re-read, movies re-watched, and grades made up the next marking period. But death? Death cannot be undone, and that’s something new. We reassure them that we’re all going to live long, healthy lives, even though we know there are no guarantees. We do our best to distance our children from Planet Death, but maybe we should respect their curiosity and invite them to take a closer look at the surface, to learn the lay of the land—after all, they’ll be going there someday.
I haven’t exactly crunched the numbers, but I think it’s safe to say that until the twentieth century most of the dead were children. At times in European history, as many as half of all children born died before they reached their teens, with many more expiring before they were even a year old. They don’t often show up in the archaeological record because, for one thing, they were so small, their remains swiftly reincorporated into the fabric of Mother Earth. Nor did they have the time to make names for themselves as chieftains, priests, ministers, or queens. They were afforded no monuments. This is not to say they were not loved or were not full-fledged personalities to those who knew them, but they were known to only a small circle of people, people who had little time for grief. During the Christian Era, these children would have been granted their own space in the churchyard while in Pagan times, tiny bodies were often kept close to home, even in the home, under the threshold or the stones of the hearth.
Both Mexicans and Mexican-Americans devote one day of the year to the child dead. Though the exact dates and customs vary, child ghosts generally arrive to partake of the treats on the family altar on the night of October 31. These altars to the dead are no solemn affairs but are decked in flowers, fruits, colorful cut-paper decorations, and, of course, candles. Offerings include food, candy, and toys. You don’t have to be Mexican to celebrate the Day of the Dead, and children especially may want take this opportunity to host their age-mates from the other side.
Happily, most of us these days must reach back through a few generations of our family before we come upon a relation who died in extreme youth. If you know of one in your own family, by all means, make an altar for this child. Even if the spirit has already wandered on, the making of the altar can be an educational experience for the living children in the household. Make a copy of any photos you might have of the child. If there are none, you can use history and costume books to come up with a reasonable likeness. A shoebox can be used to make a diorama-style altar with the child’s picture or photograph mounted on top. If you’re lucky enough to know the name of the child, include it. (I know only that my maternal great-great grandmother had thirteen children, not all of whom survived to adulthood.) Encourage your children to do as much research as they can on their own. If not much personal information is known, they can use the library, Internet, or even an American Girl catalog to find out what sorts of things a child from a particular era and/or culture would enjoy. Silk hair ribbons? A pull toy? Let them exercise their imaginations to guess what things from our world a child from the past would find intriguing. LED lights? Legos? Fruit Roll-Ups?
If you like, you can adopt a ghost from the more distant past. Whenever I go to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, I like to stop by the case containing the tomb goods of Mayet, a five-year-old “wife” of the pharaoh Mentuhotep II. Mayet, whose name means “kitten,” died around 2000 bce. What fun it would be to make an Egyptian altar for Mayet, to pick out a plush kitten for her and maybe even a Playmobil figure of an ancient Egyptian. What would she make of such things? The fun is in imagining!
Boys might prefer to make an altar for the teenaged Eutyches who also “resides” at the Met and whose likeness we have in the realistic Greek-style portrait that was painted on his sarcophagus. Or, they could propose a name for the anonymous Greek “Girl with Doves” whom we know from her fifth-century bce grave relief. Her parents would have instructed the sculptor to carve their daughter doing what she liked to do in life, enjoying a quiet moment with her two pet doves.
And then there is my personal favorite, the six-year-old girl, “Disa,” whose grave was discovered at the Viking Age trading town of Birka in Sweden. Her face and costume have been reconstructed through the wonders of modern technology, resulting in an adorably moon-faced redhead in a red wool dress. Perhaps red was her favorite color. How dazzled she would be by the wide range of hues available to us now. By the age of six, she would have been familiar with the upright loom on which all cloth was woven, and could perhaps already spin thread. Think how delighted she would be with a Rainbow Loom or friendship bracelet kit!
According to Mexican tradition (and the Mexicans have given plenty of thought to the dead), the spirits of the departed partake only of the essence of the offerings placed upon the altar. After Halloween, your own children can eat the food and candy and donate any toys you bought to a holiday toy drive. After all the work they’ve lavished on them, they’ll probably want to keep the altars.