Halloween is the great grandchild of Samhain, meaning “summer’s end,” the pre-Christian Celtic holiday marking the point halfway between the Autumn Equinox and the Winter Solstice. At northern latitudes such as ours, the earth’s bounty has been harvested and the plants are drying up, their cells are bursting from the frost, they can’t grow any more and they begin to decay. Our part of the earth turns to face toward winter. Samhain explores the increasing darkness, the thinning of the veil between the living and the beloved dead, and the mystery that every ending leads to a new beginning.