Dia De Los Muertos

This my Dia De Los Muertos shrine. It was fun to make, and I decided to make it a little more modern. So, what I did was take the photo of what I'd actually created and multiply the black roses using Photoshop. I also inserted the photos of my friend Chris and my cousin Patrick, both of whom died recently.

This was a fun assignment; I'd never made one of these before or anything like it. It was also emotional, because I've lost far too many young people in the last few years. My cousin Pete, not pictured, died at 13 in 2000. Chris died in a car accident last year, and Patrick committed suicide last year.

It's been hard, but death to me is something that I've learned to accept. After Pete died at 13, no death since has really seemed awful to me. It's been hard to really be upset by death since that, honestly. Chris died - it was sad, but it wasn't Pete. He had lived to 24, he had lost his virginity, he had graduated college... he was still to young, but he wasn't 13. Patrick took his own life, so I wasn't so much sad for him as his parents, but still - it was nothing in comparison.

Anyway, I like the idea of celebrating death rather than mourning it. I think it's a good way to do things, and I think we could learn something from that.