A Video of Me Burning a Lock of Baby Hair During Halloween

Last Halloween I made a video where I burned a lock of my ex-husband’s baby hair right on October 31, 2014. I had come across his baby hair in an envelope while I was doing some decluttering and things were so strained and hurtful between us that I just didn’t feel like delivering that small envelope to his new home that he now shares with the woman he left me for and subsequently married soon after our divorce was final. (On top of it, she was a friend of mine who had also been open and honest about her struggles with mental illness.)

I read online that burning hair in a Pagan/Wiccan ceremony is supposed to negatively affect the original owner of that hair. For added effect I decided to do that ritual on Halloween while I made a video of myself burning his hair.

Well nothing has happened to my ex-husband. I see him every now and then so I guess he’s okay but I can’t say for sure. (We are no longer on speaking terms and I’m still adhering to my therapist’s advice of not contacting him at all.)

I didn’t get around to uploading that video on YouTube until New Year’s Eve while I wrote a post on New Year’s Day about it. But I think it was the wrong time of the year to publicize it because I didn’t get too many YouTube views.

So here is the original video for you to view at the right time of the year. It also includes a cameo appearance from my American Girl doll, Julie Albright. My video explains why that doll is even relevant to my marital breakup and my ex-husband.

Interesting Article About the Origins of Groundhog Day

As you may or may not know, Groundhog Day is actually an off-shoot of the original Pagan holiday of Imbolic. One of my Facebook friends passed along this interesting article about the origins of Imbolic and how it led to later holidays both Christian (the Feast Day of St. Brigid) and secular (the aforementioned Groundhog Day). It’s worth a read, especially if you want an alternative to giving a damn about whether Punxsutawney Phil sees his shadow or not.

My Last Video of 2014 or How I Burned a Lock of My Ex-Husband’s Baby Hair on Halloween

Happy New Year, everyone! I finally got around to finishing editing and uploading this video I originally shot on Halloween and I made an allusion about a few months ago in this blog. Well, here’s the video in question.

On Halloween, about an hour or so before sunset, I made a video where I burned a lock of my ex-husband’s baby hair, which was one of the many things he left behind when he walked out on me back in October, 2011. I guess I could’ve dropped it in his mailbox at his current home but I’m still dealing with sour feelings from all those months when he totally treated me like I was little more than a robot who had to obey him or else he would sue me and refused to even treat me like I was his wife. Right now I’m just not inclined to do anything nice for him unless he issues a sincere heartfelt apology for the hell that he put me through and, to be honest, I won’t be getting one from him anytime soon.

The lock of baby hair in question was one that was originally saved by my late mother-in-law after my ex-husband had his first haircut. It was one of the numerous items that we received after her death. Then he left it behind and I really didn’t want it around. I originally thought about just throwing it in the trash but then I came across this entry by Kate Evangelista about the various superstitions concerning hair. I found that if one burned the hair in a ritual, it was supposed to bring pain to the hair’s original owner. (In case you’re wondering, this ritual hair burning didn’t work for me. My ex-husband is still healthy and I haven’t heard any talk about him being sick in any way.)

So I decided to burn the hair in a ritual and film it for posterity. Drawing on my previous experience with rituals (mainly through my Unitarian Universalist congregation and through a sub-group of the Unitarian Universalist Association known as CUUPS), I did one and I burned the hair. I also filmed an intro where I mentioned how my husband abruptly ran away from home, how he cited my purchase of an American Girl doll (Julie Albright, who’s supposed to represent the 1970’s) along with some corresponding books the day before my hip surgery as the reason why he had to leave home, along with brief mentions about how he hooked up with a friend of ours with serious mental health issues and Vikki Stark’s Runaway Husbands book.

I ended not editing it until December because I got diverted by other things. It’s fitting that I waited until New Year’s Eve to upload this video since my husband left me three days after Christmas in 2011 and he e-mailed a divorce petition in a .pdf format on December 24, 2012 (Christmas Eve). Well, anyway, here it is.

By the way, I originally had music accompanying the opening and closing credits. It’s the same tune that I used for the opening and closing credits of My Visit to the Psychic. I originally composed it in GarageBand by mixing various loops. I used it in the previous video with no problem. But when I tried to upload this new video on to YouTube, first it required me to verify that I was a real person uploading this video and not a bot by typing in my cell phone number then responding to a text. Then, after I verified that I am a real person, YouTube was claiming that the music matched “third party content” (without specifying what the content in question is) and I wouldn’t be allowed to monetize this video. I also couldn’t find any links or buttons where I could appeal and say that the music came from my own work on GarageBand. So I deleted the video on YouTube, brought the original video back into iMovie, and stripped out the music. When I uploaded the new music-free video, I had no problem at all. I didn’t have to verify that I was a human being and I could monetize my creation. So I now have gaping silence in the credits where there should’ve been music.

And one more thing, since I mentioned in this post and in the video about how my husband cited my purchase of the 1970’s historical American Girl doll the day before my hip surgery as the reason why we had to get a divorce, I came across this blog entry written by the husband of a doll collector. He seems to be more tolerant of his wife’s hobbies and interests than mine ever was. (My ex was a bit on the tightwad side even though we weren’t poor or financially struggling but that’s another story.) This woman is so incredibly lucky to have a husband like hers. Believe me, I know. If only my husband had been more like that man, we would still be happily married and we probably would’ve ended up celebrating our golden 50th anniversary sometime in the distant future.