Before You Dive In
- Día de los Muertos is a celebration of life, memory, and the bonds that outlast a lifetime.
- The people who shaped us deserve to be honored, not just remembered.
- Gratitude deepens when we recognize how much of what we love was built before we arrived.
- Community is not just where we live. It is what we tend together, season after season.
- Some of the most meaningful moments happen at a kitchen table or in a garden with the people we love.
Honoring Those Who Came Before
This past weekend my daughter and I attended a Día de los Muertos celebration at her former elementary school. There was an ofrenda, a beautifully arranged altar honoring those who have passed, and performances that filled the courtyard with color and music. It was one of those evenings that reminds you why you live somewhere.
I have always felt a deep connection to this tradition. As a Spanish speaker who has spent a lifetime in a community shaped by so many cultures, I find that Día de los Muertos speaks to something I believe. The people who came before us deserve to be celebrated, not just grieved. Memory is an act of love. Showing up to honor someone, even after they are gone, is one of the most human things we can do.
What We Made Together
A week earlier, something else happened that I keep returning to. My daughter’s friend, whose mother also grew up here in Palo Alto, came over for an afternoon craft project. Together we made succulent pumpkin arrangements using plants from our own garden, with a little moss and a few playful extras to finish them. Dusty miller. Echeveria. Passionflower. A ladybug tucked in here, a tiny skeleton there. Just enough whimsy to make us laugh.
Our mothers were with us.
My mother has lived in Palo Alto for over fifty years. She sat with us that afternoon, watching her granddaughter and her granddaughter’s friend arrange succulents into something beautiful. I found myself looking at her and thinking: how many more afternoons like this will we have? How many more chances to sit together in the garden and make something with our hands?
The answer, I know, is not infinite. And Día de los Muertos is partly about holding that truth gently rather than looking away from it.
Luminarias glow after dark at a lovely Day of the Dead celebration at my daughter’s former school
What Gets Passed Down
There is something about making things from your own garden that feels like an act of continuity. The plants we used have been growing in our yard for years. Some of them were divisions from plants my mother had. Some came from cuttings a neighbor gave us. The heart of every arrangement was already here, already rooted, already waiting to become something.
I think that is what Día de los Muertos is really about. Not loss exactly, though loss is woven through it. It is about what continues. The recipes that get made the same way every year. The songs that come back in a voice that sounds like someone you miss. The traditions that travel forward through the people who loved them first.
“Some of the most meaningful things I have ever been part of happened right here, in this city, in this neighborhood, with the people who chose to stay.”
Gratitude as a Practice
I did not grow up celebrating Día de los Muertos. But I have come to believe in the practice at its heart: the deliberate act of pausing to say thank you. Set out a photograph. Light a candle. Speak someone’s name out loud. All of us need more of that. My mother is here, alive and well, and she sat in my garden on an October afternoon and watched her granddaughter make something beautiful with her hands. I am not taking that for granted.
If one thread runs through everything I do, the work, the community involvement, the years spent in this one place, it is gratitude. For the city that raised me. For the people who built it before I arrived. For the ones who are still here, still showing up, still making afternoons like this one possible.
Palo Alto Community Questions
What is Día de los Muertos and how is it celebrated?
Día de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, is a Mexican tradition celebrated on November 1st and 2nd that honors loved ones who have passed. Families create ofrendas, altars decorated with photographs, flowers, candles, and meaningful objects. It is a celebration of life and memory rather than a day of mourning, and communities across the Bay Area hold public events and performances to mark the occasion.
How do Palo Alto schools celebrate cultural traditions like Día de los Muertos?
Many Palo Alto schools reflect the city’s cultural diversity through community events, performances, and classroom traditions. Events like school ofrendas bring families together to share and honor their heritage in ways that strengthen the broader school community.
Why does community continuity matter in a place like Palo Alto?
When families put down roots and stay, they build shared memory, neighborly trust, and a sense of belonging that new residents can feel the moment they arrive. That continuity is part of what makes Palo Alto feel like more than just a place to live.
