You need an SSL certificate for the Page Tab, Canvas, or Requests features to work. The October 1st deadline was actually for 2011. I removed that line from our configuration guide, if that's where you saw it. Sorry for that confusion.
As to your question about the subdirectory, that's fine. If you purchase an SSL certificate for a domain (
www.jonathanroseland.com), then all files, subdirectories, or any other content underneath that directory can be secured by that certificate. You don't need to purchase SSL certificates per page, just per domain.
Hope that helps explain,
Alex