#sparkchamber 103023 — Halloween

On this eve of All Hallow’s Eve, Día de Muertos, All Saints Day, Halloween, #sparkchamber celebrates this time of year when, it is said, the veil separating the worlds is the most thin and porous, enabling spirits to more easily pass between them.

Spirits are connected to the mystical and magical, to things ethereal, known yet not necessarily visible. Spirit — life force, fire, essence; muse, divine messenger, guardian angel; specter, illusion, a thing that goes bump in the night — is an intangible that can neither be explained nor categorized, contained nor counted on. We rejoice in the spirit that guides, that inspires, that moves us beyond thought and emotion, the spirit that sparks — music, dance, writing, podcasting, crafting, teaching, match-making, painting, gaming, drawing, wine-making, poetry, design, architecture, photography, film, theater — creative expression of every kind.

1.] Where do ideas come from?

There is something haunting in the light of the moon; it has all the dispassionateness of a disembodied soul, and something of its inconceivable mystery — Joseph Conrad, author [Heart of Darkness]

2.] What is the itch you are scratching?

There is something at work in my soul, which I do not understand; I am practically industrious — painstaking, a workman to execute with perseverance and labor — but besides this there is a love for the marvelous, a belief in the marvelous, intertwined in all my projects, which hurries me out of the common pathways of men, even to the wild sea and unvisited regions I am about to explore — Mary Shelley, author [this quote is from Frankenstein]

3.] Early bird or night owl? Tortoise or hare?

Every day is Halloween, isn’t it? For some of us — Tim Burton, filmmaker [Gothic Horror and Fantasy genres]

4.] How do you know when you are done?

Hell is empty and all the devils are here — William Shakespeare, playwright [this quote is from The Tempest]