Tonight, the day before the First of May, is Walpurgisnacht, a quasi-pagan Germanic holiday celebrating a English missionary/saint/abbess’ canonization. Of course, no one can tell you what she had to do with bonfires, so it seems that the name is just an excuse to keep doing what the pre-Christians wanted to do.
I’ve never—to my knowledge—celebrated Walpurgisnacht, but when I think of bonfires, I remember a night I spent with my classmates in the Alpine forests of Austria. I am almost certain this was in the fall, so it was definitely not Walpurgisnacht. And it was part of a long weekend intended as a community-building exercise.
Before the sun set, we hiked into the forest and, as the sun was going down, we built a bonfire between a hill and a small lake. I don’t remember eating anything, although it seemed we’d been hiking for awhile. (The adults who were with us had walked us in a circle earlier in the day, and the hostel we were staying at was just a short walk away.) And then the magic of the fire took over: someone started drumming with sticks and clapping; someone else started jumping over the bonfire.
I don’t know if I’d do it today, given the chance, but it was exhilarating then. The hill was situated just so as to give the jumper a good run up to the bonfire and the lake was just far enough that there was no danger of ending up in it (unless you managed to catch fire and had to). In fact, the hill was such that, if you started running, you had to jump. There was no way around the fire but over it and the hill was steep enough that you’d never stop if you tried.
I think I only went over it twice—I had to watch braver souls do it a few times, first—but it’s a feeling I’ll never forget. A feeling of one-ness with myself (rare for a young teen) and of camaraderie with my classmates, with the night, with the fire, and with the land. The magic that only popping logs in the silence and sparks in the darkness can convey.
When I see pictures of Walpurgisnacht celebrations, I’m reminded of that night in the woods and I get why, on nights like this, people believe in magic.
