BareBones

I've never been all that interested in Halloween.  Coming up with a great costume always just seems like a lot of pressure.  But I love Día de los Muertos.  I think most cultures deal with death better than Americans do, and I love the idea of a celebration that simultaneously embraces, honors, and laughs at death.

My camera isn't good enough to take photos in the dark.  But there was fire!

So for Día de los Muertos (which was actually Tuesday and Wednesday), I'm posting about a wonderful annual event in Minneapolis called BareBones.

Puppets are big in the Twin Cities.  Not hand puppets like the ones you played with in elementary school.  Giant, whimsical, awesome, beautifully artistic puppets.

One of the big puppet events in the Cities is the BareBones Halloween Outdoor Puppet Extravaganza, and Linn and I attended last weekend.  In addition to amazing puppets, there were people on stilts, aerialists, and a live band.  The show was really more of a Day of the Dead celebration than a Halloween celebration.  There were themes of accepting and embracing death as a natural part of life and remembering our loved ones who have passed.  At the end of the show the audience was invited to sing a song about remembering and call out the names of those we miss [Izzy].  Experiencing all of this outside in the dark, huddled under blankets and perched on a hay bale with Linn was quite moving.

The other thing I love about BareBones is that it's all about community.  Basically the entire event is put on by volunteers, from building the sets and puppets, to performing, to the people helping folks find their seats and directing traffic.  After the show, the Brass Messengers, a great local band, played and an amazing organization called Sisters' Camelot served soup, bread, hot chocolate, and cider to the cast and guests!

So, in honor of Día de los Muertos (a little late), take a moment to remember and send love to those amazing people who are gone now, but touched your life forever.