Holiday Time On The Winter Solstice

Well, yesterday was December 22 . This year December 22 was the shortest day but longest night of the year. That's the Winter Solstice. In pagan circles, it's the time when people draw inward and become contemplative, a time for ending things and finishing tasks. In pretty much every place where the climate drops, people draw inward into the house more and feel cozy inside while the weather blusters outside. I think of fireplaces with big overstuffed comfy chairs nearby, the warmth of candlelight, the smell of hot apple cider or hot chocolate warming on the stove, baking cookies while the snow flies around in a crazy dance. None of these things is actually happening where I live right now- it's unseasonably warm, I don't have a fireplace, there aren't any candles. I have not made cider or chocolate or baked any cookies this season. We do have an overstuffed comfy sectional near the warmth of the big screen tv.

We now have this crazy Christmas tree with that color wheel thingy my husband remembers from his childhood. His mother and I got it for him this year, because it was all he wanted when he went in for open-heart surgery several years ago and I promised him we'd get it for him. After much searching, mom found the one we were looking for at a decent price and grabbed it for us. I went all over the place finding ornaments that I thought would fit with that 1950's version of life and childhood that the tree represents for my husband. the most , Never having done all this before, it was a bit daunting deciding what to get for a silver tinsel tree, but I knew it needed to integrate with our living room decor, which is red, black and white, and the ornaments had to look retro enough but kind of postmodern. I even found some black ornaments ( those appealed to our niece's Goth aesthetics). I think I succeeded.

Initially, I had to try not to balk at the thought of a traditionally Christian symbol in my home, but after thinking about it, it was just a dopey fake tree with lots of shiny things on it which give off a soft warm light. So maybe it's a sort of fireplace replacement. Maybe for some people who were raised with this tradition, there's more to it than that, but it's not a tradition I understand or care about. So maybe for me, it's just about a cozy light and delivering on a promise I made to my husband, and perhaps giving him something that reminds him of the simpler, happy times of his childhood. And I think I did a pretty good job of decorating the tree, too, although the minimalist in me liked it better when there wasn't much on it. Apparently, minimalism is not appropriate to even silver tinsel christmas trees. Sigh. I guess that old Coco Chanel saying doesn't hold true here: pile everything on, then keep taking off stuff till it works.

Anyway, if I actually followed any tradition at all and it was a pagan one, completing the obligation of a promise fulfilled would be very appropriate to mark the Winter Solstice.

There's a guy named John Horgan who appears on Blogging Heads. He's written some interesting books, and he referred in his blog to an article he'd written for the New York Times about the Winter Solstice, which you can read here.