Halloween Starts a New Year for One Clintonville Shop
Author: Kathleen K. Radcliff
Source: Columbus Local News
While many think of Halloween as a day mainly for kids dressing up as ghosts, goblins and witches, for practitioners of witchcraft, Oct. 31 also is a special time of year.
"It is kind of considered the witches' new year," Psyche North Torok said from her Clintonville magical resource store, Fly-By-Night.
"It is a time when it is considered that the worlds between the living and the dead are the thinnest, and it is the easiest to communicate."
The Celtic new year begins at Samhein, which means "summers end," and was the final harvest of the year. This was also their "Festival of the Dead," where they honored their ancestors and deceased loved ones.
Many contemporary Halloween customs come from Samhein, including the Real Witches Halloween.
She helped ring in the new year by hosting a Witches Ball Friday night, Oct. 30, at the First Unitarian Universalist Church on West Weisheimer Road.