Let's talk about Christmas. No, really. I'm not sick of it at all. Did anyone else feel a wee bit low seeing the shops flooded with Christmas stock in October? I didn't mind when it was Ikea, because hey, I don't know when I'll next be there... but everyone else?
So, I happened on this post, about making I Spy Christmas baubles, which is a totally cool idea, but it also deals with the winter solstice, and letting in the light. A lot of Waldorf/ Steiner/ Montessori blogs that I follow really babble on about letting in the light, at the time when I'm trying to keep it, and heat, out of our house. (On that note, for Christmas, someone really ought to get us this parasol and this base. I/we hope by shading the side of the house, it will stay cooler, and so will our house. I also wouldn't mind this wind powered light because we get a lot of wind, and I've never had a wind powered light before....)
Snowflake decorations at Christmas time are a little incongruous when you're sweltering through a heat wave. Or perhaps this is why have fake snow- we like to be reminded of cooler times. But the oven on? In a heat way? So we can all sit down and eat a heavy, hot meal? Definitely time to update the traditions.
Jesus was born in the middle east, a region not known for it's snows. So I think we can safely assume that snow is a European thing, that for some reason, we cling to. WHY? WHY GUYS?
If my parents were originally from Europe, within the past 30 years or so, then maybe it makes sense for us to decorate our tree with snow flakes and sleighs. But they're not, so really, it's six white boomers for us all the way. M, Willow and myself have never seen snow, so what's the point of decorating with it?
The other day I was riding on my bike, with Willow on the back and chatting.
"Mummy, it's autumn," Willow said.
"No its not sweetie. It's spring."
"But it can't be spring! We haven't had snow or Christmas yet!" Willow wailed.
I don't really know where I'm going with this. Well, I do. Kind of. I have a lot of thoughts swirling around in my head... ideas from my own thoughts, from talking to other people. It seems that we're foolishly caught up in this idea of what Christmas should be, rather than what it seems to be... (a time of high stress for a lot of people.) So, stay tuned while I turn them into a post.
To wrap up this ramble, here's an extract from here, (What, did you think I'd bother to type all this up?) from David Sedaris' novel "Dress your Children in Courdroy and Denim." Which is hilarious. Go read it.
The words were redefined when I learned that Saint Nicolas travels with what was consistently described as six to eight black men. I asked several Dutch people to narrow it down, but none of them could give me an exact number. It was always six to eight, which seems strange, seeing as theyve had hundreds of years to get an accurate head count.
The six to eight black men were characterized as personal slaves until the mid 1950s, when the political climate changed and it was decided that instead of being slaves they were just good friends. I think that history has proved that something usually comes slavery and friendship, a period of time marked not by cookies and quiet hours beside the fire but by bloodshed and mutual hostility. They have such violence in the Netherlands, but rather than duking it out amongst themselves, Santa and his former slaves decided to take it out on the public. In the early years if a child was naughty, Saint Nicholas and the six to eight black men would beat him with what Oscar described as the small branch of a tree.
"A switch?"
"Yes," he said, "Thats it. Theyd kick him and beat him with a switch. Then if the youngster was really bad, theyd put him in a sack and take him back to Spain."
"Saint Nicholas would ?"
"Well, not anymore," Oscar said. "Now he just to kick you."
He considered this to be progressive, but in a way I think it's almost more perverse that the original punishment. "I'm going to hurt you but not really." How many times have we fallen for that line? The fake slap invariably makes contact, adding the elements of shock and betrayal to what had previously been plain old-fashioned fear. What kind of a Santa spends his time pretending to kick people before stuffing them into a canvas sack? Then, of course, youve got the six to eight former slaves who could potentially go off at any moment. This, I think, is the greatest difference between us and the Dutch. While a certain segment of our population might be perfectly happy with the arrangement, if you told the average white American that six to eight nameless black men would be sneaking into his house in the middle of the night, he would barricade the doors and arm himself with whatever he could get his hands on.
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