Leaving For Another Year

[plumtreeblossom]

Last night in RiteAid they were taking down all the Christmas stuff and making a Valentines's display. I hate it when Christmas goes away. It's always been my favorite time of year, and it doesn't feel right that it all leads up to only one day. I wish it was a twelve day festival as it was in medieval times, as well as in many of its pre-Christian incarnations. At the onset of winter in temperate climates, it's human nature to crave light and warmth, and its coming also fosters the longing for a period in the year when norms are relaxed, and something can be celebrated. Hanukkah is over, too, but it does get the multi-day thing right. It is winter. I still want more winter festival.

Comments

[androidqueen.livejournal.com]

i agree. at least it's still kwanzaa.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Indeed it is. Maybe I'll light a candle tonight. :-)

[ron_newman]

I still think of the Christmas season as ending on Epiphany. The Christmas Revels just had their last show today, but they're having a Twelfth Night celebration on January 10. Wanna go?

(I also enjoy this event, except when it's raining.)

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Oooh, if I don't have rehearsal that day, I'd love to go! (I'll know about rehearsal very soon). How do we get tickets?

[ron_newman]

There's a ticket-buying link at the bottom of that page. (Though I suspect just showing up at the door will work fine, too.) What are you rehearsing for?

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

For the Arisia PMRP show, presuming they use me!

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

See, I so don't get this. Christmas is not over. It is a twelve-day thing, from Christmas Day to Epiphany. My family has always celebrated it that way, and that's the way Christian churches I've attended (Catholic and Protestant) have celebrated it. Has it become so secularized??? But I supposed there really isn't a buck to be made from Three Kings Day, so why should retail bother!

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Most Americans don't know what Epiphany is, or Advent. I'm secular myself, but did get some Christian education from my maternal grandmother, which is why I know about them. They are nice, and they draw out the period well. Also, I read a lot about winter festival history.

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

Do they not know what Epiphany is, or do they simply know it as Three Kings' Day or Day of the Magi or something?

[ron_newman]

Being raised Jewish, I never learned about it at all. If you're mostly surrounded by other Jews when you grow up, it's quite possible to stay ignorant of most Christian (and pre-Christian pagan) traditions beyond Christmas and Easter.

[beowabbit]

I had to look up Epiphany. I had heard the term, but figured it was one of those obscure mediaeval holidays; I didn’t realize it had anything to do with the story of the Nativity, or when it occurred. (I didn’t grow up Christian, but I did grow up celebrating Christmas.)

[androidqueen.livejournal.com]

Huh, I never celebrated 12 days of Christmas growing up, and the churches my family went to didn't either.

I see Christmas as a very secular thing, and I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. And certainly, I don't think that shrinking Christmas to a single day is because retailers can't make a buck! Dude, 12 *days* of giving gifts? That's a goldmine if you can hit it!

[greenlily.livejournal.com]

I was rejoicing that the stupid diamond commercials on TV would go away, and then I went, "Oh wait...they'll start in like two weeks for Valentine's Day...and in between then and now, there are all the New Year's Resolution Diet ads...crap."

I love the Christmas season, I just hate commercials.

[ron_newman]

> Valentine's Day

Isn't there something else we should be joyously celebrating first? On January 20?

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Obamamas!

[(Anonymous)]

Yikes! The fundamentalists would have a lot of fun with that one. The "antichrist" masquerading as the messiah, they would say. As written in the book of Revelation.

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

You mean February 1, don't you? ;)

[ron_newman]

? I'm baffled.

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

The greatest of all American holidays, of course: Super Bowl Sunday!

[ron_newman]

I can't imagine too many folks in New England caring about that this winter, let alone celebrating it ...

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

That's the day when we go have tapas at Dali, because it's actually possible to walk inside and get a table right away!

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

See, we all celebrate, in different ways. :)

[bedfull-o-books.livejournal.com]

L and I went to Oasis (a Brazilian place) to avoid the super bowl crowds and they were showing the Rio Carnival parade instead. Sweet.

[skygoodwill.livejournal.com]

"I wish it was a twelve day festival as it was in medieval times, as well as in many of its pre-Christian incarnations."

Next year, let's all do that.

[kencf0618.livejournal.com]

The Twelve Days of Christmas isn't just a song, they also figure in the church year. (I'm an Episcopalian. Our calendar is color-coded!)

[moria923.livejournal.com]

In the Catholic Church, Epiphany is always celebrated the first Sunday after New Year's. Secularly, though, it seems to me the "winter festival" runs pretty much the whole of December. Christmas Day itself is often an anticlimax for me, especially since I have a new holiday tradition: being sick on Christmas. But the "festival" aspect goes on till New Year's, with parties and such. You're right, though: it's sad to see it all go away, especially knowing that it's to be followed by deep winter.

Ah well, at least we have Arisia to look forward to.

[kencf0618.livejournal.com]

A lot of people crash and get sick on Christmas inasmuch as that's when the stress is off. But the commercial holiday creep isn't just inane (St. Valentine's Day displays already?!?), it is in effect anti-sacred time.

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

Christmas season lasts from the end of November until January 6th at my place. Anyone who comes to the door is welcome.
Good food, good friends, good fellowship, and now and then a small gift, all add to the festivity. There are visits to friends and neighbors, some in hospital or nursing homes, some confined at home, are also part of the Christmas giving.

[beowabbit]

You deserve 367 Christmasses a year, sweetie! Well, we can sprinkle in some other holidays for variety. :-)