Dia de los Muertos: Day of remembering loved ones

1 comment:

• Leon Ceniceros posted at 7:10 pm on Mon, Nov 5, 2012.

  Posts: 2531

  The Feast of All Souls' Day, when I grew up, was a solemn day of remembrance...not the "gringo-ized" freak show it has become. In the Chicano Barrios of South-Central Los Angeles, most of the 1st or 2nd or 3rd Generation Chicanos went to a Requiem Mass (I know, I was an altar boy as were both my brothers) with a Benediction at the end. Luckily, I was tall and held the Cross while my poor buddy, Claude, swung the incensor back and forth, back and forth. Talk about asbestos in your lungs, old altar boys must have a 1/2 pound of incense ash in theirs. Everybody was still "holy" after going to Confession before All Saints Day (mandatory Mass attendance or a mortal sin) so Communion was a given.
  The Chicanos living in the East Los Angeles Barrio were mostly from Central Mexico so they celebrated it with the skulls and all the weird stuff. Us South-Central LA Chicanos are mostly Nortenos (Chihuahua, Sonora, Durango States) and were more circumspect. Mostly everybody who could go to the Cemetery went to clean up the Graves, get rid of weeds, wash the headstone, put a blue enameled cup of champurrado and an enameld small plate with some pan dulce, a small candle was lite and if the deceased was a man, a shot glass of whisky or brandy. If the grave was for a woman, then some pretty flowers. The family would kneel and say a rosary. No face paint, nothing joyous. It was a day of sadness not a day to carry on.

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