I like Halloween and Guy Fawkes. I like the fact that there's a depth of feeling to them, but that you don't have to do anything. There are no days off work, or major interruptions into regular daily life - they just kind of happen. I love Christmas, but it comes with a lot a jazz. There's all the planning, the Christmas shopping. In fact, I'm already slightly stressed about Christmas shopping, and it's still two months away. Whereas here we are on the very day of Halloween and it's no worries at all. Maybe there'll be a few knocks on the door tonight, but even then there's no obligation to open it.
I tend to enjoy Guy Fawkes slightly more, but even with that it's just as a passing spectator. Walking home in the dark, from work or a friends, and seeing the skies filled with fireworks. The vague awareness that it dates back 400 years; that it's uniquely tied to British history, in a way that other holidays aren't. All that coupled with the knowledge that the bonfires simultaneously lit date back thousands of years. Deep into some ancient past.
I remember the first time I ever heard the Stone Roses first album was on Bonfire Night. I had about an hour to listen to it, before heading out to wander the streets with my friends - checking out the local bonfires. One of the good things about living on a council estate back then was that it was still wild enough to have a sense of danger. Bonfires on every local field, higher than houses. The danger that someone would throw a firework at ya. There was always a weird night-at-the-fair type atmosphere. Everything seemed more gypsy and feral. Anyway, hearing that album for the first time, in my darkened bedroom, with fireworks filling the skylight of the window was quite a 'wow' moment. The only track I was familiar with was She Bangs The Drums, so it was almost entirely new to me. I wanted to listen to it again, but I also felt the pull of the bonfires outside.
That seems a long time ago now..
Now it feels like Halloween England is a refuge from the rest of the world, not an autumn fairground. Dwarfed by international politics. The instinctive feeling is to retreat into Britishness. In many ways things like Guy Fawkes feel like a celebration of being left alone. Lighting fireworks to celebrate that we've secured a few more centuries of not being bothered by the rest of the world. Like English archers flipping the V to the French.
In my head I feel (or rather think) that I really need to shake off this Britishness, and have a more worldly attitude. It feels a little selfish and narrow-minded to be so parochial. However, whenever I turn on the media to see what's happening in the rest of the world it just turns me off. The feeling that all these people are just beyond help and reason. Even London feels foreign through the phone lens. If it's not protestors protesting for or against Israel/Palestine, it's wacky people with English flags, dressed up like St. George, calling for mass deportations.
Up here, in the north, where I live, I don't see any of this stuff. In fact, the other day I was on the bus and I sat watching an African immigrant guy helping an old white guy with a walker off the bus. He watched the old guy step off the bus like a parent watching a toddler on the stairs. The difference from what I was seeing on my phone that day couldn't have been starker.
Anyone that's read this blog over the last few years will know that I'm not saying everything is therefore rosy. The immigration levels are ridiculous. In the long run we will end up like Lebanon if it continues like this. In the short term we will have massive homelessness and overcrowding. However, it's not the end of the world, and the solution is pretty obvious: reduce the inward immigration. We don't need anything wacky, like deportations of people born here, or political parties just for Muslim people.
I really feel that if we just get a handle on immigration we'll integrate everyone here (tricky though that might be) and Britain will just be fine. When I look at the rest of the world though, I really don't know what the answer is, and saying we just want to be left alone to enjoy the fireworks won't cut the mustard with them.
(That went from whimsy to seriousness pretty quickly, I'll bring it back with some happy pumpkins..
🎃🎃🎃
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