Right now it's after midnight on what I still like to think of as the first day of October, I'm watching Disney's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow while my black cat races around the house, and thinking about family traditions. My family has always loved this month, from corn mazes and pumpkin carving to elaborate gauntlets of terror constructed up our considerable childhood driveway to terrorize Hallowe'en party guests. The sort of people who get offended when Christmas decorations show up on the shelves before November, we make the most of this month.

Some of the influences are obvious. My love of mask, costume, and disguise stem in part from enthusiasm for dressing up every year. Then there's the multitude of lights, from shivering candles in hollowed pumpkins, to little tea lights in paper bags, hooded lanterns with black silhouettes set in windows that feed my affection for a lantern's ambience. And of course, the folklore, the roots of so many modern traditions, of which most of us are only dimly aware. Do you know why you went door to door for candy as a kid? Why you carve pumpkins? Why you don fearsome garb when the night rolls around? (Although nowadays 'sexy' seems to be the norm for terrifying malevolent spirits)

For the most part, we perpetuate these traditions because our parents did so, and so we pass them on to our children, and they will likely do as well. The same can be said of any holiday or folk custom, but I've already uttered the dreaded C-word once out of season, so we won't be going there. We combine seasonal associations such as dry leaves, crisp air, rain (at least for we West Coast-ers), corn, autumn squash (aka pumpkins), with long-standing customs such as guising and souling (akin to caroling or wassailing), and a hodge-podge of Christian and pagan customs, all crammed together to conjure up a cohesive mood we call Hallowe'en. Yet even if we don't know the origins of these myriad customs, and perpetuate them because they conjure the right atmosphere, the reasons for them remain. If we sift beneath the dry leaves on the surface, we should find the earthy source below.

(Read on and share your traditions at Eventide Unmasked.)