The Wearin' O' the Black (Friday, That Is)

When the alarm rang at six, I wandered out to the living room and took the ad scraps I'd cut from the paper yesterday into the bathroom with me.

It convinced me there wasn't anything I wanted That Damn Bad. :-) So I went back to bed until James' alarm rang.

He went off to work (his phone rang once and it wasn't even a "real call") and I went to Lowe's, where they had various holiday containers on sale for $4.99. Since the cheapest I've seen those tall skinny giftwrap containers has been $8.96 (that was JoAnn—at half price!) I grabbed two, one for Christmas wrap and one for presents the rest of the year.

I did wander into the garden center and saw that they had little tabletop-size Frasier firs with container for only $14.95. Boy, was I tempted; I love real Christmas trees. But it would have to live on the porch since I'm allergic. Sigh. Sorry, I don't want bronchitis for Christmas like I did the last time we had a real tree.

With some trepidation, I went to Target. By this time it was almost nine and I expected a mob. There were lots of cars, but absolutely no long lines. Most people were crowded in the electronics department. I was astonished. Anyway, I got sale copies of the special edition of Miracle on 34th Street (with commentary by Maureen O'Hara!), Ice Age 2, and for $5.95, a copy of National Treasure (I don't really like Nicolas Cage, but this movie was just goofy fun enough that I enjoyed it).

Oh, and I got the very last Shark stick vac they had for $10. If it doesn't last long, well, I didn't spend much. It's basically a hand vac with a "power head" and a stick handle that turns it into a little stick vac.

Stopped at Walgreen's to pick up a little "garnish" for a couple of presents and got a red sweatshirt to make Christmasy. Then drove to the elegantly named "the Avenue at West Cobb" (there's also an "Avenue at East Cobb" that has a Borders and a Bed, Bath and Beyond; this one has the Barnes & Noble and the Linens and Things). I assume the partner shopping center also has two big red Christmas ornaments flanking its entrance, too. :-)

Just checked out the magazines and bargain books in B&N, then pondered a high-dollar purchase in Linens, and checked out what the weekend specials were at Hallmark before I committed myself. Then I drove on to the Town Center area and hit Costco for gas before going to Borders.

Turned out the one Christmas CD I wanted from them was not at that Borders, but at all the others. Sigh. Just popped on the freeway and drove down to the Borders that is closest to our house. The CD was the newest Revels release, English and Scottish Christmas and celebratory music. I also got three books on the bargain table: Eloise at Christmastime (sold for $17.95 last year; I got it for $2.99), a book of Christmas stories, recipes and crafts, and a little book of Christmas prayers and poetry.

The newest of Jill Churchill's "Grace and Favor" mysteries was out, so I got that, too, and something called Carpe Demon, which sounded cute: soccer mom is also a demon hunter (think Buffy the vampire slayer grown up). And the November issue of the British version of "Country Living." I love the British version because the American one is cool, but it basically talks about decorating your house in country style and recipes. The British version is about really living in the country and features interviews with smallholders, people who run walking tours and construct buildings or gardens in the old manner, etc. Lots of pics of the countryside.

Came home, tidied the house (it was cleaned for Thanksgiving, so I was home free) and watched Miracle with the commentary on. I can't say that I learned all that much from it, but Maureen O'Hara told a little about how she got the role and how strict the studio was, complimented Natalie Wood's talent, mentioned her other two roles with John Payne, reminisced about Christmas in Ireland, and commented, of course, on the famous "Post Office" scene, which I guess is everyone's favorite scene in the movie--anyway, it is mine! :-) She sounds so well, voice very strong, and she was 86 this summer--bless her!

I watched the colorized version. It was okay. I usually hate colorized movies like poison, but when they said in the liner notes that they had looked at color photos of the actors and Macy's and New York to get the colors right, I decided to try it. Some things were quite good, but they still don't have white flesh yet (the African-American lady who appears briefly as Doris' maid looks as if she was on color film, but the white complexions are still pretty-fake looking). I noticed that in anyone who doesn't have lipstick on, the men and the children, the grey of the black and white comes through the lips and looks unnatural and teeth still look grey. On the other hand, the clothing, wallpapers, upholstery, Christmas trees, and scenery was not too bad. The gold lettering on some of the stores and the gold trim looked best of all.

Also listened to the Revels album and then a couple of other Christmas things while I looked through my books. However, I still hadn't looked through my embroidery threads before James came home. They're on sale 5/$1 at JoAnn and I need to look and see if any of my colors are getting low.

We went to JoAnn anyway. I'll look at the threads tomorrow and go back while he's at his club meeting.

"As Yellow as Gold"

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Here is a pumpkin, fluted, golden,
Written o'er with customs olden
Out of bygone days.
Cinderella's ancient glory,
Sung in song and told in story,
Suits its yellow blaze.

Tables at the first Thanksgiving,
When colonial dames where living,
Shewed its golden sheer.
Still it smiles a friendly greeting
At the happy family meeting
On the feast-day dear

Christmas rooms are gay with holly,
Christmas sees the merry folly
Of the mistletoe.
Easter lilies, pure and stately,
In the springtime bloom sedately,
When soft breezes blow.

Autumn dressed the woods in splendor;
But their colors, rich and tender,
All have passed away.
Now the pumpkin, ripe and mellow,
Keeps a tint of Autumn's yellow
For Thanksgiving Day.

Mary E. Knowlton (1904)

Eeeeek!

High Winds May Blow Out Parade Balloons

Hard to believe they used to release the balloons at the end of the parade for people to find!

Famous Thanksgiving Songs

One secular, one religious.

This is the long version of Lydia Maria Child's "A Boy's Thanksgiving Day," a.k.a. "Over the River and Through the Wood." Nope, they're not going to Grandmother's (or Grandfather's, rather) house for Christmas. A very Northern New England poem!

Over the river, and through the wood,
to Grandfather's house we go;
the horse knows the way to carry the sleigh
through the white and drifted snow.

Over the river, and through the wood,
to Grandfather's house away!
We would not stop for doll or top,
for 'tis Thanksgiving Day.

Over the river, and through the wood-
oh, how the wind does blow!
It stings the toes and bites the nose,
as over the ground we go.

Over the river, and through the wood.
with a clear blue winter sky,
The dogs do bark and the children hark,
as we go jingling by.

Over the river, and through the wood,
to have a first-rate play.
Hear the bells ring, "Ting a ling ding!"
Hurray for Thanskgiving Day!

Over the river, and through the wood-
no matter for winds that blow;
Or if we get the sleigh upset
into a bank of snow.

Over the river, and through the wood,
to see little John and Ann;
We will kiss them all, and play snowball
and stay as long as we can.

Over the river, and through the wood,
trot fast my dapple gray!
Spring over the ground like a hunting-hound!
For 'tis Thanksgiving Day.

Over the river, and through the wood
and straight through the barnyard gate.
We seem to go extremely slow-
it is so hard to wait!

Over the river, and through the wood-
Old Jowler hears our bells;
He shakes his paw with a loud bow-wow,
and thus the news he tells.

Over the river, and through the wood-
when Grandmother sees us come,
She will say, "O, dear, the children are here,
bring pie for everyone."

Over the river, and through the wood-
now Grandmothers cap I spy!
Hurrah for the fun! Is the pudding done?
Hurrah for the pumpkin pie!

About Lydia Maria Child

We Gather Together

We gather together to ask the Lord's blessing;
He chastens and hastens His will to make known;
The wicked oppressing now cease from distressing,
Sing praises to His name: He forgets not his own.

Beside us to guide us, our God with us joining,
Ordaining, maintaining His kingdom divine
So from the beginning the fight we were winning;
Thou, Lord, wast at our side, All glory be thine!

We all do extol thee, thou leader triumphant,
And pray that thou still our defender wilt be.
Let thy congregation escape tribulation;
Thy name be ever praised! O Lord, make us free!

A Hymn's Long Journey Home:
The Surprising Origins of "We Gather Together," a Thanksgiving Standard

This isn't the version I learned, incidentally. Apparently there is a Catholic version that contains the following verse:

We gather together to sing the Lord's praises,
To worship the Father through Jesus His son.
In this celebration all sing with jubilation;
We are His holy people whose freedom He won.

But I don't remember the rest. I was so very puzzled the first time I watched the America segment "Home From Home" and heard them singing "We Gather Together" with the three verses stated above.

And just for a bit of Thanksgiving jocularity (I can hear William Christopher doing Father Mulcahy now), here's Tom Lehrer's version of that venerable hymn:

We gather together to ask the lord's blessing
For turkey and dressing and cranberry sauce.
It was slightly distressing, but now we're convalescing,
So sing praises to his name and forget not to floss.

Our nearest and dearest we don't want confessing,
It's sort of depressing to have them so near.
Our feelings suppressing for lightly acquiescing,
And perfectly professing we're glad they were here.

We gathered together and got the lord's blessing
Of course we're just guessing 'cause how can you tell?
Our stomachs are bloating, our kidneys nearly floating,
Hellos are very nice, but goodbyes can be swell.

Excitement in the "Big Apple"

They're polishing up the trumpets and doing a last fitting for Santa Claus in New York for the Macy*s Thanksgiving Day Parade (warning: site requires Flash 7).

I still miss the old CBS parades. Originally (or at least when I first watched them in the early 60s) they were hosted by Captain Kangaroo. Then William Conrad took over. He sat on a warm plush "men's study" type set with a big fireplace sipping a toddy as he introduced the different segments, which switched to the guest announcers actually freezing out there in the cold, especially in Toronto (Eaton's Santa Claus Parade) and Detroit (Hudson's Department Store parade). I think the Santa parade is still held, but it's not sponsored by Eaton's anymore (I believe the store has gone out of business). I wonder if they still have the Storybook Land theme for the floats. It seems old hat for today's kids who play Nintendo and listen to I-Pods. I think I read the Detroit parade is still going on, but no longer sponsored by Hudson's. I'm not sure any of the Hudson's stores are still around, but their subsidiary, Target, is everywhere.

The old Gimbels parade, of course, in Philadelphia, is long gone. Macy's (ooops, Macy*s), overcame their old rival years ago and then managed to eat up Atlanta's Davidson's and Rich's stores, Boston's venerable Jordan Marsh and Filenes, and dozens of others. The more famous Philadelphia parade has always been the Mummers' Parade at New Year's, but I'm not sure it's broadcast nationally any longer.

The kiss of death at CBS for me was when they began broadcasting the Hawaiian parade. Yawn. Who wants to look at dopey flowers before Christmas?

CHRISTMAS BOOK REVIEW: Christmas After All

Quite possibly the best Christmas book I've ever read.

I've been reading them since the 1960s, when my favorite was Frances Frost's Sleigh Bells for Windy Foot from the school library. The story doesn't necessarily need to involve magic, like The Legend of Holly Claus; even more I like stories of regular families having a warm holiday season: The Tuckers: Cottage Holiday is a prime example. The new Callahan Cousins book is pretty good in that department, but it can't compare to the three examples above, or A Christmas Carol, or Christmas After All.

The "Dear America" books are something I can take or leave. I got a couple with good coupons and the rest on the remainder shelf. My Secret War was pretty good, as was When Christmas Comes Again (not really a Christmas book, but about the "Hello girls" in World War I), and the story of the Italian girl crossing the great plains. The Titanic book was average and the Pearl Harbor book was pretty bad. I've heard some pretty scathing criticisms about the two books involving Native American characters.

But in Christmas After All, Kathryn Lasky has created a masterpiece within the diary format of the books.

It is the story of Minnie Swift, youngest of four sisters, her precocious genius younger brother Ozzie, and her parents during the days of the Great Depression. Dad's job is going badly and the family is reduced to shutting down rooms in their home to cut down on coal bills. They rarely have meat for supper, but eat a succession of aspics and "O'Grotons," as Minnie calls them.

Then, as December begins, Willie Faye Darling comes into their life. Willie Faye is the only daughter of cousins of Minnie's mother. Her parents, from a small town called Heart's Bend, Texas, have died after losing a battle with life in the Dust Bowl. Willie Faye is Minnie's age (11), but looks two years younger due to malnutrition and hardships. She arrives at the Swift home covered in dust and with a kitten named Tumbleweed whose nose she had to suction out morning, noon and night to keep him from smothering. Willie Faye has never seen an indoor bathroom, gone to a movie, read a Buck Rogers comic, or listened to the radio, so Minnie thinks that Willie Faye will have a lot to learn from them.

She never dreams what she—and the entire family—will learn from the fragile-looking but tough little girl from the Dust Bowl when the ravages of the Depression begin leaching away the family's security.

I have many of Lasky's other books and love them as well (the only series of hers I couldn't get into was the Starbuck family books), including Prank, which takes place in East Boston, and her adult mysteries starring Calista Jacobs. But Christmas After All has a special magic to it, perhaps because it is based on Lasky's mother's experiences as well as her own and the characters ring true.

Christmas After All is highly recommended.

The "First" Thanksgiving Actually Comes at the End

Here's Caleb Johnson's MayflowerHistory.com site, which includes a review of last night's Desperate Crossing, the three-hour (with commercials) documentary re-inactment of the Pilgrims, beginning with their move to Leyden in the Netherlands to escape the wrath of the King of England and ending with "the first Thanksgiving," which, as has been pointed out on many sites, really has nothing to do with what the Pilgrims would have considered a "thanksgiving," which was a day of prayer and fasting. The scene we re-inact today is what the Pilgrims would have known as a harvest festival or "Harvest Home."

Plymouth Rock? No one even remembered it until 1841 when an elderly man claimed that the big rock the citizens of Plymouth were about to build a wharf over was, according to his grandfather, who heard it from his grandfather, where the Pilgrims had stepped off the Mayflower in 1620 (actually, they came ashore in small boats). The Rock actually remained in the wharf until Victorian-era Americans, venerating the Pilgrim forefathers, extracted it (and broke it in half). Most of the cute little myths we believe about Thanksgiving were actually created by the Victorians, including the black Pilgrim hat that still serves as a symbol for the Massachusetts Turnpike and the big-buckle shoes and the legend of how popcorn was first eaten at the feast attended by the surviving Pilgrims and Massasoit's Wampanoug tribe.

I recorded the whole thing which is a good thing because I missed a lot fussing over that frelling gas log with James. I did enjoy what I saw, although I wonder if the real Pilgrims (and "Strangers") actually did use the very formal forms of speech you often heard in the program. Johnson comments about several scenes sounding stage-y.

(Music Listening To: Windham Hill, "Thanksgiving," specifically that very American hymn, "Simple Gifts.")

CHRISTMAS BOOK REVIEW: Callahan Cousins: Together Again

Well, I might as well review the fourth Callahan Cousins book here, since I've hit all the others.

We've been through Hillary being insecure about her parents' divorce (The Summer Begins), Neeve being insecure about a family secret (Home Sweet Home), and Kate being insecure about not being cool (Keeping Cool). Now it's bookworm Phoebe's turn to be insecure—about Christmas celebrations and faith.

In this fourth book summer is over, but the girls have once again gathered at Grandmother Gee's big house on Gull Island to celebrate the holidays. Phoebe, who's from Florida and the voracious reader in the bunch, has one big wish: to celebrate the kind of Christmas she's always read about in her beloved books. Not a snowless, cheerless (at least to Phoebe) Christmas where her dad and sisters decorate with tacky garish plastic ornaments and sing kareoke carols, but one full of sleigh rides, and home-made gifts, ornaments, and treats, and snow, snow, snow. She comes to Gull Island complete with her own "wish book" (a notebook of magazine and newspaper clippings) about just how "it should be" and ends up roping her cousins into helping her achieve this goal through helping her with the things they do best (creative Kate will help them do crafts and baking, sporty Hillary will arrange sledding and other winter athletics, friendly Neeve will be social director for parties).

Of course Phoebe goes overboard—it's a lietmotif of the series—but her desire is so charming that I really enjoyed the story. Come on, who among you that is a Christmas lover has not wished for the grand and glorious holiday you've read about in books and seen in the movies? Who hasn't wanted to have a grand party with friends gathered around a magnificent old-fashioned tree (perhaps with candles, however dangerous) and then go out caroling house to house, filled with the spirit of bonhomie? To celebrate a deep, meaningful Christmas like the Ingalls family or Anne Shirley or the March girls and eschewing the canned music, buy-buy-buy commercials and adverts, and the plastic sentiments? I know the idea appeals to me tremendously (although not the tree with the candles!); I spent my childhood wishing I could go to one of those parties like on Petticoat Junction where everyone ends the night singing old songs—or Christmas carols!—around the piano.

The generosity of her cousins (except for Neeve's occasional protests) and finally her grandmother enables Phoebe to have the Christmas she wants, but there are a few bobbles along that way including a warm front—Phoebe, for all her reading, seems to have missed the fact that shorelines and islands don't usually get the type of Vermont-like snow she's pining for and it melts faster when it does snow—and interference from snotty Sloan Bicket. There is a more serious thread woven through this outing: Phoebe's reluctance to show emotion and also her need for something spiritual to believe in for the future (hence the heavily angel-centric theme that comes into play soon after the book begins).

It's a fun Christmas outing with some thought behind it and a good way to finish out the tetralogy.

Splendor and Spectacle

If not England, this is where I'd like to go someday: German Christmas Markets. I've read and seen photos of these wonderful places for years. Probably couldn't afford a thing after travelling there, but just being among all those lovely ornaments and the smell of gingerbread and spices...heaven!

Christmas DVD Wish List

#1: The House Without a Christmas Tree
#2: The Gathering

Also, all those great Perry Como Christmas shows.

A couple of obscure ones: Simple Gifts, which was a collection of animated shorts that appeared on PBS in the late 70s. One of them was about the Christmas truce, another was about "The Great Frost," a third was taken from a letter written by Theodore Roosevelt as a boy, etc. This is a much-requested item on TV Party. Also, from the same era, PBS did a special based on Norman Corwin's radio play in rhyme, "The Plot to Overthrow Christmas." The gimmick to this one was that the first half hour showed how a radio show was produced, and then the story was presented as part of the second half hour. The show featured radio veterans such as Ezra Stone, plus Edward Asner as Santa Claus.

The half-hour animated version of A Christmas Carol featuring Sir Michael Redgrave. This was done in the style of Victorian drawings and won an Oscar for best animated short.

REVIEW: "Christmas Classics," Volume 1 DVD

This is the title of an el cheapo DVD I picked up at Fred's (sort of a poor man's Woolworth's) in a paper sleeve; only cost me 50¢ as I recall. It has three 1950s Christmas presentations on it, including the one featured on the cover, the Christmas episode of Date With the Angels starring Betty White and Bill Williams.

The first offering is "A String of Blue Beads," taken from the classic Fulton Oursler story about a storekeeper named Pete, who, embittered after the death of his fiancé, finds life again on Christmas Eve thanks to a little girl. This is a very short story that has been embellished mercilessly for its 26-minute timeslot; some of the embellishments, such as showing him with Marilyn, the girl he loves, are fine additions, but had they stuck to Oursler's original dialog it would have been a lot better. The whole cast is very stiff and Louis Jourdan is just not my idea of Pete. The "acts" of the story are introduced and closed by marionettes and the passing of time is, interestingly, illustrated by seasonal paintings from a Manhattan art gallery.

It is also filmed in some rudimentary version of color which has altered and faded so that the only two colors seem to be red and green (with the occasional flash of beige). It was so ennerving that I finally turned the color down and watched it in good old-fashioned black and white.

The second cut is from a religious series called Crossroads, which is, the titles and the credits tell us stenoriously, vetted by a military Protestant chaplain, a Catholic priest, and a rabbi. The story, "Our First Christmas Tree," concerned a German minister who planned to introduce a Christmas tree into the service and was roundly cheered by the local children and condemned by the children's parents, who think the minister is taking their children away from "the Bible, the Psalms, and hymns" and leading them to worship a pagan idol. These neighborhood busybodies never give the well-meaning reverend a chance to explain and are about to tear down the tree when the minister's brother, also a man of the cloth, explains to them how the tree fits into the ceremony. I have heard several stories of the origin of the Christmas tree, the two most popular being the story of Martin Luther coming home in the snow one night and seeing the moon sparkling on the snow-covered branches of the fir trees, which led him to create a similar scene in his home with candles on a small cut tabletop tree, and the story of St. Boniface, who, seeing Druids about to make a human sacrifice, chops down the Holy Oak and a small pine tree springs up in its place.

But I had never heard the story the pastor tells his brother's congregation, about all the animals and plants going to Bethlehem to worship the Christ Child and of the struggling little cedar that almost gives its life to do so, and is rewarded by God with everlasting life and has stars rained down upon its branches.

Of course the congregation is abashed and the pastor and the happy children have the Christmas tree. (One of the boys is played by Todd Ferrell, who played Timmy's buddy Boomer for a year on Lassie.) Again, done in a rather stiff style, but with a charm of its own.

The Date With the Angels "Christmas Show" probably would come as a revelation to devotees of today's sitcoms. While there are two-tart tongued characters in the story—Vicki Angel's (Betty White) friend Connie, played by Nancy Kulp, who later went on to fame as Jane Hathaway in The Beverly Hillbillies, and Richard Deacon—Gus and Vicki Angel are our sweet-tempered protagonists (not an insult is passed between them) who help an elderly neighbor (the father of Richard Deacon's character) get a Santa Claus job at the department store where Connie works for a Mr. Scrooge-ish manager and also assist a lost child at the store. It's very sweet and nostalgic, and all three are interesting representations of 1950s Christmas programming.

I haven't seen Volume 2, if one actually exists, but it would be interesting to see what was on it.

XM Holiday on the Air!

Whoa! I was cooling my heels waiting for the train and paging through the XM stations and found their Christmas channel, "Holly." What a surprise, then, to find that they actually have five Christmas channels, but the others don't start until Thanksgiving.

It doesn't show up on this page, but there's also "Radio Hanukkah" on from December 15 to 25.

Checked to see if Sirius had their music channel up, but I don't find it. Dish Network's Christmas music channel isn't on yet, either. Perhaps on the 15th.

(Coda, November 20: Sirius' holiday music starts on Thanksgiving. They are again taking over the Starlite channel for popular music, one of the country channels for country music, and the Pops channel for classical Christmas music.)

"Remember, Remember, The Fifth of November..."

If your only experience with the name "Fawkes" is reading Harry Potter novels, here's the skinny on Guy Fawkes, whose Gunpowder Plot and its defeat have provided the British with an annual holiday devoted to fireworks and bonfires.

Lesser known is that Guy Fawkes Day was celebrated in "the colonies" at one time, although its name was changed and some definite Catholic bashing went on.

"17th and 18th-century Bostonians celebrated the anniversary of the English Gunpowder Plot as Pope's Day. To mark the occasion, residents of the North and South Ends held separate parades, carrying effigies of the Pope with them. Both parades led to the center of town, near the Old State House. When the two groups met, a riot typically ensued; each group fought to secure the other's effigy of the Pope. The group that succeeded in doing so was declared the winner."

From Boston History.org

More on Guy Fawkes Day:

Fawksian Society Website

Guy Fawkes and Bonfire Night

Wikipedia Entry

Scrap Album's Guy Fawkes Victorian Images

Woodlands Junior School's Bonfire Night Site

Holiday Spot's Guy Fawkes Day Site

CHRISTMAS BOOK REVIEW: Christmas in New England

This slim book by Amy Whorf McGuiggan, published by Commonwealth Press, is a delightful compendium of short takes about notable Yuletide events from the New England states, with a little Christmas history tossed in. Since many people's idealized Christmas is that of a New England Christmas, with sleigh rides, fresh balsam trees, etc., it's always hard to realize that for a long time, due to Puritan influence, the very word "Christmas" was anathema in the far Northeast, unlike the South which celebrated with guns and bonfires and the middle states with their settlers of German and Dutch ancestry, who had Christmas trees and the custom of St. Nicholas.

McGuiggan's text, enlivened by black and white photos and a color insert, talks about the various memorable parts of a New England Christmas: fresh balsam trees from Maine, Nova Scotia's annual tree gift to Boston in memory of that city's assistance after the deadly explosion in Halifax Harbor in 1916, the "Flying Santa" who for years dropped gifts to the isolated lighthouse keepers' families, a bell factory that made the original sleigh bells (far from being just "something pretty" to listen to when you went sleighing, bells were actually required by law, so pedestrians could hear the silent sleighs coming), Boston's "Christmas for the Horses," charity events, etc. Some very touching personal stories are included.

I'm hoping McGuiggan is aiming for a sequel, because it beats me how she's done a book about notable New England Christmas traditions and not once mentioned Edaville Railroad! Now Edaville USA (it's still open), this is a small steam train setup in South Carver, Massachusetts, that is especially popular in the fall and winter. It was closed in 1991 but was resurrected in 1999. Before the cranberry harvests, Edaville would offer a ride through the cranberry bogs and then take riders to a pumpkin patch with refreshments of hot cider and other goodies. But Christmas is when Edaville really "shines." They have a seven-million-strong holiday light display and other events.

I also didn't see the fact that the first department store Santa Claus originated in New England. In 1841, a Philadelphia storekeeper named Parkinson had a man dress as "Crisscringle" and enter his store through the chimney as a publicity stunt (a pivotal scene in Jeff Guinn's just-published Great Santa Search), but the masqued Santa didn't remain at the store and talk to children. Fifty years later, the Boston Store in Brockton, Massachusetts, featured a Santa who sat among the toys and listened to children's wishes for Christmas, the first real "department store Santa."

Since New Year's is part of the Christmas season, I also expected to see some events in that area mentioned, especially "First Night," which originated in Boston.

However, I give the contents of this volume a solid B+ and hope Ms. McGuiggan brings us another volume in the future.

Hallowtide

The name "Hallowe'en" is a a corruption of "All Hallow's Eve," which is the night before All Saint's Day, November 1. The following day, today, is All Souls' Day, where prayers are said for those who have died. The entire period is called "Hallowtide."

CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: All Souls' Day

123Holiday.net's All Souls' Day Page

During the 19th and 20th centuries children would go "souling"—rather like carol singing—requesting alms or soul cakes:

A soul, a soul, a soul cake.
Please good missus a soul cake.
An apple, a pear, a plum or a cherry,
Any good thing to make us merry.
Up with your kettles and down with your pans,
Give us an answer and we'll be gone.
Little Jack, Jack sat on his gate,
Crying for butter to butter his cake.
One for St. Peter, two for St. Paul,
Three for the man who made us all.

The "Soulers" would go around the houses singing this song. Soul-caking has survived throughout the west Midlands, from Coventry to Manchester to Sheffield.

From Woodlands Junior School's Facts About November.

"Souling" is thought to be one of the origins of "trick or treating" on Hallowe'en.

Additional lyrics:

God Bless the master of this house, the mistress also,
And all the little children who around your table grow.
Likewise your men and maidens, your cattle and your store,
And all that dwells within your gates we wish you ten times more.

The lanes are very dirty and my shoes are very thin.
I've got a little pocket I can put a penny in.
If you haven't got a penny, a ha' penny will do;
If you haven't got a ha' penny, then God bless you.

You can see that it shares some similar lyrics with the round "Christmas Is Coming (The Goose Is Getting Fat)."

Here's a soul cake recipe:

Ingredients

3/4 cup butter
3/4 cup caster/superfine sugar
4 cups plain flour, sifted
3 egg yolks
1 teaspoon mixed spice
1 teaspoon allspice
3 tablespoons currants
a little milk

Method

- Cream the butter and sugar together until pale in colour and fluffy in texture.
- Beat in the egg yolks.
- Fold in the sifted flour and spices.
- Stir in the currants.
- Add enough milk to make a soft dough.
- Form into flat cakes and mark each top with a cross.
- Bake on a well-greased baking tray in a hot oven until golden."

Peter, Paul and Mary sing "A Soalin'" (sic) on their "Holiday Celebration" CD.

Found This a Bit Late

Saved for next year:

Carve Your Own Pumpkin

"Trick or Treat, Smell My Feet..."

"...give me something good to eat...look out, look out, the goblins are out!"

Which means I watched the For Better or For Worse Hallowe'en special, and then It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, and then it was time to man the door for the real-life Hallowe'en denizens.

I wore my cat outfit (black sweats, white gloves, and a black and white cat mask) and got lots of laughs from the adults taking the children around. There were several little girls dressed as cats and they seemed astonished to meet yet another cat! (Another tiny blond boy, however, seemed a bit overwhelmed by the costume and almost started to cry until I showed him it was a mask, after which he solemnly told me "Bye-bye.") I also had several compliments from the adults and the older kids about the decorations on the porch and in the foyer, which made me feel really chuffed! (A useful word that.)

The little girl next door was Elmo, and we had several Disney princesses, a cool kid in black robes with red eyes that glowed from a distance, a Ninja Turtle, various monsters and ghouls, several skeletons, Raggedy Ann, and too many others to remember. Everyone was happy and polite (no slouching teens who made no effort at a costume) and the little ones ran about shrieking happily. All the candy was gone and I had to turn away six kids, so that means we had about 76 in two hours and ten minutes.

Pidgie chirbled through much of the procedure and Willow of course barked. I can't remember when I enjoyed myself and at the same time felt so lonely and melancholy in my life.

Spooks and Goblins from Years Past

Vintage Halloween Postcard Gallery

Early 1900s Crepe Paper Halloween Costume

Old Fashioned Halloween Party

In Color...

I had just finished looking at photos on the Vermont Fall Foliage website—the color was spectacular this year!; I now have their photo of Killington as my wallpaper—and just happened to read this article about hiking Vermont's Long Trail afterwards:

"Take up the trail again, follow it to a mountain crest, and you will see something that is not quite like anything else. There is nothing bleak and aloof about these mountains; they are soft, rounded, friendly giants clad in incomparably beautiful garments and holding in their laps, like toys, the homes of men. Here and there is a silver pendant on a silver chain, for there are lakes and streams without end. North and south is the tumbled green range; shading to blue in the distance; east, across the multicolored woods annd hills, are the White Mountains; west and four thousand feet below, in the oldest valley in America, Lake Champlain and its islands stretch out of sight; and close beyond are the purple Adirondacks, fold upon fold. For a hundred miles in every direction the cup of beauty is full to the brim."

Merritt Parmalee Allen, "Let's Take the Trail," St. Nicholas 1928

All painted so well in words!

"Shopping for a Man"

This was on my Christmas to the Max list; had to share:

Buying gifts for men is not nearly as complicated as it is for women. Follow these rules and you should have no problems.
Rule #1:
When in doubt - buy him a cordless drill. It does not matter if he already has one. I have a friend who owns 17 and he has yet to complain. As a man, you can never have too many cordless drills. No one knows why.
Rule #2:
If you cannot afford a cordless drill, buy him anything with the word ratchet or socket in it. Men love saying those two words. "Hey George, can I borrow your ratchet?" "OK. By-the-way, are you through with my 3/8-inch socket yet?" Again, no one knows why.
Rule #3:
If you are really, really broke, buy him anything for his car. A 99-cent ice scraper, a small bottle of deicer or something to hang from his rear view mirror. Men love gifts for their cars. No one knows why.
Rule #4:
Do not buy men socks. Do not buy men ties. And never buy men bathrobes. I was told that if God had wanted men to wear bathrobes, he wouldn't have invented Jockey shorts.
Rule #5:
You can buy men new remote controls to replace the ones they have worn out. If you have a lot of money buy your man a big-screen TV with the little picture in the corner. Watch him go wild as he flips, and flips, and flips.
Rule #6:
Do not buy a man any of those fancy liqueurs. If you do, it will sit in a cupboard for 23 years. Real men drink whiskey or beer.
Rule #7:
Do not buy any man industrial-sized canisters of after shave or deodorant. I'm told they do not stink - they are earthy.
Rule #8:
Buy men label makers. Almost as good as cordless drills. Within a couple of weeks there will be labels absolutely everywhere. "Socks. Shorts. Cups. Saucers. Door. Lock. Sink." You get the idea. No one knows why.
Rule #9:
Never buy a man anything that says "some assembly required" on the box. It will ruin his Special Day and he will always have parts left over.
Rule #10:
Good places to shop for men include Northwest Iron Works, Parr Lumber, Home Depot, John Deere, Valley RV Center, and Les Schwab Tire. (NAPA Auto Parts and Sear's Clearance Centers are also excellent men's stores. It doesn't matter if he doesn't know what it is. "From NAPA Auto, eh? Must be something I need. Hey! Isn't this a starter for a '68 Ford Fairlane? Wow! Thanks.")
Rule #11:
Men enjoy danger. That's why they never cook - but they will barbecue. Get him a monster barbecue with a 100-pound propane tank. Tell him the gas line leaks. "Oh the thrill! The challenge! Who wants a hamburger?"
Rule #12:
Tickets to a Red Wing/Lions/Pistons/Tigers game are a smart gift. However, he will not appreciate tickets to "A Retrospective of 19th Century Quilts." Everyone knows why.
Rule #13:
Men love chainsaws. Never, ever, buy a man you love a chainsaw. If you don't know why - please refer to Rule #8 and what happens when he gets a label maker.
Rule #14:
It's hard to beat a really good wheelbarrow or an aluminum extension ladder. Never buy a real man a step ladder. It must be an extension ladder. No one knows why.
Rule #15:
Rope. Men love rope. It takes us back to our cowboy origins, or at least The Boy Scouts. Nothing says love like a hundred feet of 3/8" manila rope. No one knows why.

Breezes!

A cold front pushed its way through last night so the first thing I did upon arising was fling open the windows to be greeted by a sweet autumn breeze. I decided to have breakfast at the Starbuck's at Barnes & Noble and just for the heck of it ducked next door to CD Warehouse (they sell used items)—and got an astonishingly good deal on the new release of Little Mermaid and fourth season of Hogan's Heroes. Also found Bambi II at a very good price and a CD of Christmas music totally done by brass orchestras.

Since James' mom and sister (cross fingers) are spending Thanksgiving with us, I bought a fall tablecloth at Linens'n'Things with one of my coupons.

I also went to Garden Ridge looking for something but didn't find it. However, upon walking in I was surrounded by Christmas decorations glittering to my right and fall decorations glowing to my left. Summer has been so hard on my health that I had to resist the urge to spin about like Mary Tyler Moore and pronounce happily "I'm home! I'm home!" since it was all so welcoming.

Came home to find the house cool and breezy and was feeling so chipper I committed poetry:

Vivid blue sky,
autumn leaves fly--
gold, orange, red.
Summer has fled
back to her den.
Can't wait till when
cooling winds blow,
hinting of snow.
Bonfires burn
while the leaves turn,
and gingerbread
children are bred;
savor near fire,
after all retire,
with cocoa--Yay!--
while branches sway
in crisp delight
on moonlit night.
From settling leaves
now Nature weaves
beds for flowers.
Counting the hours--
for when leaves fly,
Christmas is nigh!

A New Leaf

It's that time of year when a "young New Englander's fancy turns to thoughts of leaves" (not to mention the middle aged and old New Englander—LOL).

Here's a Mount Washington Cam and a view of Mount Washington Valley. Looks like the color will be good this year.

Not much obvious color in Providence yet from the panorama shot, however, if you click on the second picture from the right, which is the new Johnson and Wales campus (where the old Outlet Department Store used to be), several maple trees are heralding the turn of the season.

(Can't see much color here in Burlington, VT due to the camera position, but look at Lake Champlain!)

Columbus Day weekend is the traditional "leaf peeping" weekend for New Yorkers and New Englanders. Even the folks at the Yankee Magazine home headquarters have forsaken the shot of the green in Dublin, NH, in favor of the treecam.

Wonder what I-91 going toward Rockingham, VT, looks like. It parallels the Connecticut River and is lined with trees. When we went up to the Vermont Country Store there two years ago, it was way past peak.

More fall links.

Angel Songs at Avonlea

Marilla probably wouldn't approve of Anne wearing her hair loose like this, but here are "Diana" and "Anne" singing.

Christmas Lights and "Kindred Spirits"

At Sam's today we checked out all their gift and decoration aisles; tons of stuff: several large gorgeous Nativity sets, also a Victorian village in a box (4 buildings and the ice skating pond and a bunch of different figures), and of course those big gift baskets of chocolate or tea things.

At the end of one aisle were the lights and they had several different choices of LEDs, which James has been interested in getting. Each different size (three in all) had multi and white bulbs, but the small ones also had blue strings. Well, we are "blue fools" with our outside lights and candles; only the tree is multi. I had bought five strings of 100 blue mini lights last year when they were on sale, but we still didn't use them because the idiot who designed our old house didn't put an outside plug in the front.

James' eyes lit up (pun intended! ) at the sight of LED lights, so he bought a box to decorate the porch. There are 180 lights in the string, 48 feet of lights in all. I suppose we can buy another string if needed, but it's not a big porch!

We also went to JoAnn since I had a 50 percent off coupon courtesy one of the ladies in one of my Christmas groups. Last week I had seen some small caroler figures about the size of large action figures; these are dressed in heavy "clothes" and carry different things. Several of the girls had red hair and since I've always wanted to be a redhead I wanted to buy at least one. Sadly, I couldn't use the coupon because they were already on sale. I picked out a red-headed girl with a roll of music in her hands, a red cap, and an old-fashioned plaid skirt, then had a glimmering of an idea but couldn't find a dark-haired girl caroler (all the dark haired girls were African American). The other carolers were all blondes or red heads. I did see one caroler in a cape and muff where only a little of her hair showed. Like Mary Clancy in The Trouble with Angels, I had a "scathingly brilliant idea." :-) I will get a dark marker or some black paint (whatever will work best) and darken her hair. Then I will have Anne Shirley and Diana Barry singing Christmas carols at Green Gables!

Christmas Books to Look Forward To

First there's Christmas in New England, which has already been released. I don't expect to see it in my local area, so will have to order it. Here is the table of contents—doesn't look like they have a chapter on Edaville Railroad, though; I thought that would be de rigueur!

There's also the sequel to Jeff Guinan's two Santa Claus books, called The Great Santa Search. This brings Nicholas' and Layla's story to modern day America, where a reality TV show looks for the real Santa. Sounds like a hoot.

Taaschen also has this book about Christmas memorabilia available.

Fall Festivals of Old

From School of the Seasons (very interesting site, BTW!):

September 28 Michaelmas Eve, Crack Nut Day
In the Scottish highlands and islands, an unblemished ram lamb called the Michael Lamb is killed for tomorrow's feast. Women make special cakes called struan Michael or Michaelmas cakes, from equal parts of all types of grain grown on the farm, kneaded with butter, eggs and sheep's milk, marked with a cross and cooked on a stone heated by a fire of sacred oak, rowan and bramble wood. A piece of the cake is thrown into the fire as a tithe to St. Michael's opponent, the Devil. Other cakes are made for special people, for the family and for the community. Cranberries, bilberries, brambleberries, caraway seeds and wild honey are baked into the cakes. Clearly part of the purpose of this charm is to take the bounty of the farm's harvest and use it to fashion an offering of thanks.

It is OK to steal horses on the eve of Michaelmas so the men sit up and watch their horses.

In Surrey in England, this day is known as Crack Nut Day and nuts are cracked and eaten in churches (see September 14). In Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, people build bonfires on the Eve of Michaelmas and scatter grain for the wild birds to bring luck to the farm.

September 29 Michaelmas
This is the feast day of St. Michael and all the Angels. It is the most ancient of all the angel festivals. The Anglican church celebrates all angels, both name and unnamed on one day. Roman and Orthodox Churches separate them into two categories (with the unnamed angels having their feast day on October 2nd).

From fairly early on, Michaelmas was an important holiday, the religious or Christian equivalent of the autumn equinox. In England, it was considered the start of a new quarter. It marked the start of a new business year, a time for electing officials, making contracts, paying rent, hiring servants, holding court and starting school. Obviously we still see the remnants of this in the timing of our elections and school year.

This is also a time when the weather is known to change. In Italy, they say "For St. Michael, heat goes into the heavens." In Ireland, people expect a marked decrease in sickness or disease. The Irish also consider this a lucky day for fishing:

     Plenty comes to the boat on Micheael's Day.
     Barolini records a nursery rhyme about hours of sleep:
     Nature requires five,
     Custom gives seven,
     Laziness takes nine
     And Michaelmas eleven.

Michaelmas became the fixed date for the feast otherwise associated with Autumn Equinox or the harvest. As early as 1014, the laws of Ethelred in England prescribe a three day fast for all Christians before the feast. Servants weren't allowed to work during these days. Michaelmas was a time when rents were due, and rents were often paid in food. The traditional rent for Michaelmas was a goose.

Eating something rich like goose at this turning point of the year brings good luck. In Nottingham they say "If you eat roast goose on Michaelmas day, you will never want money all year." In Norfolk, they say, "if you don't baste the goose on Michaelmas Day, you will want money all year." In Yorkshire, they use the condition of the meat of the goose to predict the weather:

     If the goose breast at Michaelmas be dour and dull
     We'll have a sour winter, from the start to the full.

Fitzgibbon says the Irish used to stuff the goose with potato to cut the grease and absorb the flavor. This is like the traditional onion sauce served with goose in the 18th and 19th centuries and made from onions cooked in half milk and half water, with a slice of turnip, then mixed with butter, nutmeg, cream, salt and pepper and mashed. Apple sauce is the most common topping today.

In Italy, where this is clearly considered a harvest festival, they say "For St. Michael all the last fruits of the year are honeyed and ripe."

Cosman says that it is traditional to eat ginger on Michaelmas. She mentions ginger ale, beer and wine, gingerbread, ginger snaps, fish baked with ginger and two ginger desserts: charwardon (made with large succulent wardon pears, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger) and ginger caramels with curls of ginger-root shavings on top.

Michaelmas daisy is the name given to flowers of the aster family which bloom at this time. I've seen it applied mostly to purple asters but Barolini says she used to pick yellow Michaelmas daisies on the beaches near Rome. She also made a yellow sponge cake called "Margherita" (daisy) on that day.

St Michael
Michael is a warrior angel often pictured poised with a sword over a dragon (or demon) that he tramples underfoot. Other times he rides a white steed, and carries a three-pronged spear in his right hand and a three-cornered shield in his left. He cast Lucifer and the other evil angels out of Paradise. Thus, in the Middle Ages was invoked as the patron of knights and warriors.

He's been honored since ancient times as a protector. Most of his churches are on high places, for instance, Mont St. Michel in Brittany, the church on the tor at Glastonbury, the church on the tumulus at Carnac. They were often built on the sites where Lugh, the Celtic God of Light, was worshipped earlier.

Although all angels are sent as messengers from on high, Michael has a special task. He's sent to fetch the souls of those who have died for judgement. For this reason he is also considered the patron saint of all trades that use scales which mean he looks after pastry chefs and weighers of grain.

Carolee Colter translated this Litany of Saint Michael from the French prayer card she purchased while visiting Mont St. Michel in Brittany:

Saint Michael, archangel, pray for us.
Saint Michael, chief of all the angels, pray for us.
Saint Michael, filled with the wisdom of God, pray for us.
Saint Michael, very glorious prince, pray for us.
Saint Michael, strong in combat, pray for us.
Saint Michael, terror of demons, pray for us.
Saint Michael, vanquisher of Satan, pray for us.
Saint Michael, our support in the fight against evil, pray for us.
Saint Michael, prince of the celestial militia, pray for us.
Saint Michael, faithful servant of God, pray for us.
Saint Michael, messenger of God, pray for us.
Saint Michael, angel of peace, pray for us.
Saint Michael, guardian of Paradise, pray for us.
Saint Michael, support of the people of God, pray for us.
Saint Michael, guardian and patron of the church, pray for us.
Saint Michael, benefactor of people who honor you, pray for us.
Saint Michael, whose prayers reach to heaven, pray for us.
Saint Michael, who introduces souls to the eternal light, pray for us.
Pray for us, Saint Michael, archangel.

House Shadow Drake - Michaelmas

Catholic Encyclopedia: St. Michael the Archangel

Episcopal Readings for Michaelmas

The Michaelmas Daisy

A Michaelmas Blog Entry by Peter Walker

Feast of St. Michael (Michaelmas)

Holly Jolly Ho-Ho-Ho!

Just got back from "WallyWorld" where we saw some cute stuffed Rudolph figures. They all play some dialog from Rankin-Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer followed by a song. The largest is a Yukon Cornelius with his sled with Rudolph and Hermy sitting on it. This plays dialog from the story and then the song "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer." Then there are five (that we saw, anyway) single figures. Santa sings "Jingle, Jingle, Jingle." Yukon sings "Silver and Gold." Hermey sings "A Couple of Misfits." Rudolph sings...well, "Rudolph." :-) And the Bumble growls but I can't remember the song because by that time we had all the other figures singing as well. :-) I think it might be "Rudolph" again or "Holly Jolly Christmas."

Now I'm wondering if there is a Sam the snowman singing "Holly Jolly" or a Clarice singing "There's Always Tomorrow."

As the Year Turns

Celebrating the Autumnal Equinox

Defining the Autumnal Equinox

Symbols of the Autumnal Equinox

Autumn Greetings

The Fall is Upon Us

And just to celebrate with others:

Autumn Greeting Cards from 123Greetings.com

"We'll Deck the House with...Leaves..."

The cooler weather made me feel chipper enough to put out the fall things after I had opened up all the windows (and doors) and turned on the fans. (I'd love to stock this entire house with Vornado fans; I have our one Vornado next to my bed and it's so nice and quiet—on high it makes the same level of noise as our other fans make on low and on low you have to walk next to it to even hear it. But they cost about four times as much.) I replaced the seasonal things—the bouquet on the kitchen table, the lilac bouquet in the hall, the display table and plaques in the foyer, and the wreath on the front door.

I usually wait until the equinox to put up the change of seasons, but I read something this summer that made me pause: September 22nd isn't "the first day of autumn"; it's just the fall equinox. Meteorological fall begins September 1. So I've put things up because it feels like fall (even if the temps will go back up over the weekend).

The combination of the cozy fall colors and the liberating open curtains and windows was quite a contrast. We're used to living "dim" in the summertime with insulated curtains (except on the dining room windows) because it keeps the heat down in the house and helps the air conditioner not run as much, so it's a bright surprise to have the sun streaming in windows and filling the house with natural light. The construction of the old house, sadly, really didn't allow a lot of the sunlight to break through, which was a positive thing in summer, but made the rest of the year rather dull: the den was self-contained and dark because of the paneling, no matter how sunny it was the kitchen was always dark because of its placement in the tree'd back yard with the neighbors' larger house blocking most of the sunlight, and the upstairs rooms blocked by the hallway. It was like living in a cave most of the time.

While putting away the summer things, I peeked into the box of Halloween and Thanksgiving decorations. I'm reluctant to overspend but am wondering if I should buy a couple of more Halloween things, mostly for the porch. Never been much of a Halloween person, but this year looks like it might be fun because of the neighborhood and the kids. I already have the three decorations I bought from Moores, plus a couple of signs and the old jack o'lantern; don't really want to get into the lights stuff. Maybe one of those stiff black spiderwebs with the purple spider? Or another sign from Michael's (Michael's has these signs with which, as James commented, you could make a reproduction of Diagon Alley if you tried.

Closet Treasures

One of the things we loved about this house was the walk-in closet on the ground level. It's not a huge closet by any means, maybe 4x5 feet, but it was certainly larger than the little coat closet where we had kept all our decorations crammed for ten years: mostly Christmas, but also for other holidays and seasons. When the seasons turned it was like a clown car with storages boxes coming out, being rearranged, and going back in; the only time it was half empty was during Christmas.

Today we visited Hobby Lobby. They had all their ceramic and resin figures and statues on sale. I'm not much of a Hallowe'en person still, but I had fallen in love with a jack o'lantern they had there: James actually thinks it's glass, with an opaque but iridescent type paint on it: the orange skin and a green stem, with the black eyes done in some sort of matte texture. Not sure of how it looks under incandescent light, but in fluorescent light it simply glows without having a light in it. It was counted in the half-price items, so I bought it. I also got the cutest fabric reindeer with my 40 percent off coupon. Both needed to be stored away.

It's occurred to me for several weeks, since bringing home various Hallmark ornaments and fall things, that I needed to clean out the "Christmas closet" and find the rest of my fall things, as we had bought some autumn decorations last August at A.C. Moore in Warwick, RI, and a few things at JoAnn and Michael's. So while James was at his club meeting, I dove into the closet. I'm still not finished and my feet hurt, but all the patriotic things are now in a container, all the summer flowers in another, the spring and Easter things in what used to be the Thanksgiving container, and the Thanksgiving and Halloween things in their own box which had been a hotchpotch of things. The big steamer trunk that was my grandparents' has been shifted again. I have an idea to do what my dad used to do and store the Christmas tree with the lights on it (thereby relieving myself of that dreaded job) under plastic, and I needed the corner where the trunk was for it to stand upright. It's clear but I haven't moved the tree yet since I want to vacuum there.

In the process of cleaning out things I tossed away some old decorations that were too dusty to donate and found some things that didn't need to be packed away: a couple of gifts, the apple crock that James bought me last year at the Christmas Extravaganza at the Cobb County Civic center (it's for dips; you put ice in the bottom part and then put the matching ceramic bowl inside the crock and it keeps the dip cold so you don't have to worry about the sour cream base spoiling), the Christmas linens (which I will put in our closet with the other rarely used kitchen things like the turkey roaster), the autumn tealight holders and the battery powered tealights that go with them, and the autumn wreath for the front door.

I still need a container for the winter/Valentine's Day decorations but everything's a little neater (or will be once I vacuum and put it all away).

For now I'm going out to supper...

Angels Unaware

TCM was doing David Niven movies today; I finally got a decent copy of The Prisoner of Zenda this morning. This evening they showed The Bishop's Wife, and, despite the fact that it's the depths of August, I settled down to watch it as if Christmas were approaching.

I love this movie. I've heard complaints that it's in black and white (eyes roll) or that it's too slow, but I find the leisurely pace magical, as Dudley the angel slowly makes the household happy and reminds Bishop Brougham what's important in life. There are wonderfully funny scenes with Monty Woolley as the Professor (especially the magically refilling wine glasses) and the Bishop's chair problems and the gossips at Michel's, and simply magical ones like Dudley telling Debbie the story of David, helping Debbie play in the snow, and finally the lovely ice skating scene. It brings back old-fashioned scenes of children romping in the snow, Christmas trees being decorated on Christmas Eve to surprise the children next morning, department store windows full of toys, live trees purchased from the florist, and beautifully paned windows—I even enjoy looking at the different windows in this exquisitely dressed film: the diamond colored glass of the Professor's apartment, the bottle-bottom round panes in Michel's, and the beautiful casement windows of the bishopric. The whole film is so colorful that I forget it's in black and white; I can imagine it all myself in living color.

This film was commonly shown at Christmas when I was quite small, then it disappeared. Of all the memories I took away from the film back then, it wasn't the actors or even the story, but of Dudley decorating the tree with a swish of his hand, and most of all the Christmas sermon about the empty stocking. It is a timeless one.

"Tonight I want to tell you the story of an empty stocking. Once upon a midnight clear, there was a child’s cry. A blazing star hung over a stable and wise men came with birthday gifts. We haven’t forgotten that night down the centuries; we celebrate it with stars on Christmas trees, the sound of bells and with gifts—but especially with gifts. You give me a book; I give you a tie. Aunt Martha has always wanted an orange squeezer and Uncle Henry could do with a new pipe. We forget nobody, adult or child. All the stockings are filled...all that is, except one. And we have even forgotten to hang it up. The stocking for the Child born in a manger. It’s His birthday we are celebrating. Don’t ever let us forget that. Let us ask ourselves what He would wish for most and then let each put in his share: loving kindness, warm hearts and the stretched-out hand of tolerance. All the shining gifts that make peace on earth."

Coping and Counting the Days

If you sneak into my cubicle right now I am playing Christmas music.

I was hoping perhaps this year it would be different, that being in a new house would make the difference in the way I felt in the summer, since James wouldn't have to climb on the roof to clear off the pine straw and clean the gutters and I wouldn't be standing there below with my heart in my mouth, and with a brand new air conditioner and airy-er rooms, hopefully no ant invasions to contend with.

But I can't help it, summer gets harder and harder to bear every year; if I could get the years back at the end of my life I'd consider hibernating May through September (and what would I do about work?). The hot flashes make it more difficult to bear the heat and when I get the least bit warm I feel "funny"—I can't even describe the sensation, but it makes me worry about my heart. Plus when I do get too overheated, like last Friday, my heart does start tripping a bit (not over 100), which is unsettling.

Add that in combination with end-of-fiscal year work—and the huge wasp that managed to get in last night; it disappeared after we saw it near the lamp and have no idea where it's lurking—and we're talking good old fashioned depression here. Hence the Christmas music.

I'm enjoying the fact that the crafts stores have their fall items and even some Christmas items out; I buy one or two small things to fit into the "Autumn Hollow" theme every weekend, which may sound like I'm going berserk, but it signifies that proverbial light at the end of the tunnel, and it's not a train.

The foyer of the house is pretty much decorated up to peak, except that I would like to put a wreath on the wall that you face when you walk into the house. But because this wall is over the stairwell that goes downstairs, it is difficult to get to the area. James and I were discussing the possibility of, since it's a half wall, an overlook from the living room, that we could suspend the wreath on a ribbon from the top.

There are several fall angels, both wooden and ceramic, with leaves for wings, dotted about. I need to rummage around in the photo box and find a pic of my mom to put there; I have the frame already. Then there will be a real angel continuing to look after us all.

I finally finished what I wanted to do on the brickwork on the small porch on the front of the house. There is sort of an arch shape which almost looks as if a window could have been placed there but wasn't (there are sidelights on the door, so you really don't need one) and it looked bare. I put up a primitive-painted Americana type plaque there that I purchased at JoAnn, having gimmicked up the trees in the picture to look as if they have fall leaves on them and put a brown wash over the grass to make it look more autumn-y. But it looked dreadfully alone in that brick opening, so Friday with my Michael's coupon I bought a leaf garland, eschewing the more colorful ones for one with muted color and green leaves among the turning ones, to surround the plaque with. I removed the pumpkins and raffia it came with and used them in something else to mute it even more. It fills up the area a bit and adds to the house theme without being overt.

All the ceramics were on sale this weekend at Hobby Lobby, so I bought a dark leaf-orange "cake stand." I wanted something tall for the Expedit divider between the living room and kitchen and bought an apple topiary (because kitchen and dining room are themed in apples and cows). But it wasn't quite tall enough to "pull it up" the way I wanted, so I have the topiary on top of the cake stand, and around the topiary pot a large candle ring of autumn leaves to meld the two themes.

I'll have to keep up with the fall distractions until the real thing arrives, just to keep upbeat.

Three weeks from this coming weekend: the Yellow Daisy Festival, a wonderful precursor to fall. Yay!

Buffalo Gals and Bunnies

Remember A Christmas Story in 30 seconds reinacted by bunnies? Here's It's a Wonderful Life.

Golden Age Holidays

I don't see anything on their page, but if you subscribe to XM Satellite Radio, they are having a "Christmas in July" feature on their Radio Classics channel, 164, starting July 17 (the announcer didn't say how long it would run).

Some of these classic radio comedy Christmas stories are hilarious—the one where Jack Benny bedevils a store clerk played by Mel Blanc is a classic and was repeated on television. Sometimes for the holidays even the comedies would veer into sentiment. Many of them had regular features, such as Amos explaining to his daughter the meaning of the Lord's Prayer in Amos'n'Andy and the singing of Ken Darby's arrangement of "The Night Before Christmas" on The Johnson Wax Program (starring Fibber McGee and Molly). "The Cinnamon Bear" is a classic children's serial that ran in 24 10-minute increments on each of the December days before Christmas for many years.

Rabbity Goodness

A Christmas Story in 30 seconds, re-enacted by bunnies.

A St. Paddy's History

Found this interesting article after the fact:

READING ROOM: St. Patrick’s Day

Authentic Irish "Shamrocks"

Or are they? Heck, we had clover all over our old lawn. I like clover!

Selling "Shamrocks" a Seedy Business

A Holiday of Home (and Homecoming) and Hospitality

St. Joseph’s Day fast approaches!

St. Joseph’s Day, on March 19, honors the foster father of Jesus. As the St. Joseph's Day Home Page explains, this is a large, popular holiday in Italy, especially in Sicily, but it is also celebrated here in the United States in Italo-American neighborhoods with parades and other festivals. New Orleans has a St. Joseph’s Day parade almost concurrently with their St. Patrick’s Day celebrations. Some neighborhoods in New York City hold elaborate St. Joseph's Day get-togethers.

This Hallmark site explains a little more about St. Joseph’s Day.

Most of the articles mention as part of the celebration something called a St. Joseph’s Table, a tiered arrangement holding breads and other special items, especially used in Italy. I must confess that I’ve never seen one of these beautiful arrangements. The church I went to as a child, St. Mary’s, was the old-fashioned Italian church (as opposed to St. Ann’s, next door, the “Irish church”) and may have had these when I was very small; they followed the old ways until well into the 1960s. But after Vatican II and the English Mass rather than the Latin, these old customs were done away with, except for the Procession at the annual feast in July. I remember that St. Mary’s used to do a wonderful grotto-type nativity arrangement when I was very small, similar to the putz scenes used in German communities at Christmastime, with a mountain with various figures coming and going, miniature trees (as on model railroads), other flora and fauna, and the Holy Family in the center in a shallow cave, with shepherds and other figures around them. It’s possible they also had a St. Joseph’s Table back then. I think it’s sad that these old customs have been allowed to fade, since it is part of my heritage.

St. Patrick’s celebrations are usually thick with liquor; the Italian tradition for St. Joseph’s Day is to eat…”Mangia, mangia!” is the mantra of the day. Bread, fava beans, and frittate all have a place in the menu, but the food that most Rhode Islanders know best for St. Joseph’s Day is the zeppole. There are several different versions of zeppole, including a fried version a little like round doughboys (fried dough, elephant ears, whatever else they’re called around the country), but the most well-known version is pictured here on RI Roads St. Joseph’s Day page. This traditional zeppole has a cream-puff type shell filled with thick, flavorful yellow cream and topped with a ring of white cream with a maraschino cherry for trim. In the past the shell was fried, but now many of the bakeries bake them instead, to save a bit on the calories (although the cream is decadent enough!).

You can see by this recipe that they are extremely work-intensive, but the bakeries in Rhode Island (and I’m sure in NYC) turn them out by the thousands at this time of year. (In fact several RI bakeries now make them year-round because of customer demand). I noticed that the Providence Journal has an article this year telling people the best places to go for zeppole.

Italiansrus.com contains some links to other recipes for St. Joseph’s Day.

Another St. Joseph’s Day event is the annual return of the swallows to San Juan Capistrano Mission in California. These little birds make an amazing 15,000 mile round-trip migration every year, arriving at San Juan Capistrano on or around March 19.

(If you're in the Atlanta area, I believe the 48th Street Market in Dunwoody—off Mount Vernon Road—has zeppoles for St. Joseph’s Day; this is also a wonderful Italian deli which serves some other Italian pastries like sfogliatelles. Unfortunately they're not baked there, so you miss the authentic taste of an Italian bakery, but it's good for a sample at least.)

"Dust Thou Art..."

Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of the Season of Lent. It is a season of penance, reflection, and fasting which prepares us for Christ's Resurrection on Easter Sunday, through which we attain redemption...[t]he ashes are made from the blessed palms used in the Palm Sunday celebration of the previous year. The ashes are christened with Holy Water and are scented by exposure to incense....[Catholic Online]

During Mass on Ash Wednesday, each attendee comes forward and is marked on the forehead by ashes from the priest's thumb, drawn in a cross, while the priest says "Remember, Man is dust, and unto dust you shall return."

The color for this liturgical season is purple, except on Good Friday and Holy Saturday, when the color is black to signify Jesus' death. On Easter Sunday the color becomes white, to symbolize His resurrection.

Some other links:

Catholic Encyclopedia: Ash Wednesday

BBC Religion & Ethics, Ash Wednesday

Ken Collins: Why Ashes on Ash Wednesday?

Ken also addresses the term "fasting." When I mentioned we used to "fast" on Fridays and often people "fasted" completely during Lent, many people interpreted that as not eating at all. Ken explains "Today the word 'fasting' means a total abstention from all food. In the historic Church, it means a disciplined diet so that your animal appetites become a sort of spiritual snooze alarm." We did not eat meat or other rich foods on Friday all year round before Vatican II, and during Lent you were supposed to observe this every day. After Vatican II, the requirement to eat only fish on Friday was lifted, except during Lent. Small children and the elderly were exempt from this requirement.

It is little known today, but there used to be other 40 day periods like Lent on the liturgical calendar. Advent, for instance, originally was a 40-day period, and fasting was observed, although not as strictly as during Lent.

The other tradition, of course, was "giving up something for Lent." Most Catholic schoolchildren remember giving up candy (or a favorite candy) or snacks for Lent; some gave up television altogether or at certain times, or eschewed comic books or something else they enjoyed. Some kids cheated and "gave up" foods they hated. I tried, but my mother said I was not allowed to give up spinach for Lent! :-)

When neighborhoods had churches in walking distance from their parishoners, many Catholics attended morning Mass every day during Lent. Churches usually had a 6 a.m. daily service back then and people would go before work.

The Lessons for Ash Wednesday, from the Episcopal Lectionary

Mardi Gras: It Isn't Just About Bacchanalia in the Streets

Shrovetide is the English equivalent of what is known in the greater part of Southern Europe as the "Carnival", a word which, in spite of wild suggestions to the contrary, is undoubtedly to be derived from the "taking away of flesh" (camera levare) which marked the beginning of Lent.

More about Shrovetide from the Catholic Encyclopedia

And more:

BBC Religion & Ethics: Shrove Tuesday

James Kiefer's Shrove Tuesday Page

All that drinking, eating, and partying in the streets originally came from an effort to rid your house of meat, milk, eggs, and the other rich foods you were forbidden to eat during Lent but which would spoil if left until Easter. In England, this meant the cooking and eating of pancakes, and there the holiday is usually referred to as "Pancake Day."

Woodlands Junior School's Web Page about "Pancake Day"

Elaine's Pancake Day Page

Domestic-Church.com's Pancake Day Page

The most interesting custom to come out of Shrove Tuesday were the pancake races. One, in Olney, England, has become world famous.

No one is quite certain how the world famous Pancake Race at Olney originated. One story tells us of a harassed housewife, hearing the shriving bell, dashing off to the Church still clutching her frying pan containing a pancake. Another that the gift of pancakes may have been a form of bribe to the Ringer, or Sexton that he might ring the bell sooner; for the ringing of the Church bell was the signal for the beginning of the day's holiday...[Olney Pancake Day Site]

Read more about the Olney races.

In 1950 the race became an international event. A challenge was received from the town of Liberal in Kansas, USA, where they had, after seeing press photographs of the race at Olney, conceived the idea of starting a similar custom. Olney readily accepted the challenge and, in a spirit of international goodwill and friendship, the two towns now compete annually and prizes are exchanged....[Olney Pancake Day Site]

More info from the city of Liberal and the International Pancake Day site.

"Will You Be My Valentine?"

I guess we were pretty typical as mid-60s elementary school kids.

The boys wore their hair short and parted to one side or the other. The occasional cowlick or bowl cut appeared. They wore button-down shirts—often "cowboy shirts" with piping—and pressed troussers (often courderoy in this winter season, or wool). The girls were in dresses, skirts and blouses, or jumpers. Short hair was popular (especially with moms who had to wash that hair), held back with a headband. They wore sturdy Oxfords or Hush Puppies, or strap shoes. A few extroverts whose moms allowed it wore patent leather dress shoes and might have had their hair permed. Ringlets were still popular, too, and hair bows. To stay warm during a long walk to school or at recess, the girls often wore snow pants under their dresses; these came off in the morning along with the thick winter coats and hats and scarves and rubber boots that fit over your shoes and were stowed in the chaos known as the cloakroom behind folding bulletin-board doors.

Valentine’s Day didn’t start immediately after Christmas as it does now. Yuletide was allowed to wind down past the new year before the candy started to appear, but it was only at the tail end of January and into February that schoolchildren started to gear up by surveying what classroom valentines were for sale in the eternal delight of the 60s child, "the five and ten"—Woolworths, Newberrys, McCrory, Ben Franklin, and whatever other local store plied the trade.

The least expensive Valentines, most endorsed by Mom, were just plain little hearts and cupids and other cartoon-like boys and girls or animals wishing each other a happy day or professing love or affection. Girls' Valentines featured dolls, flowers, cute animals, and lots of hearts. Boys' Valentines would more likely have their youthful protagonist in a train engineer's uniform or spacesuit, or would feature trains, cars, airplanes, or construction equipment. Specialty cards, like those with Disney characters or the cartoon heroes of the day like Yogi Bear and Huckleberry Hound, or theme cards involving real-life race cars or spaceships or television programs were pricier. There was always one, larger Valentine in the box reserved for the teacher; the most common design was some sort of a blackboard with the message written in white "chalk." These were purchased and (sometimes) laboriously signedover and over for twenty to thirty classmates until the day you could dump them in the big box on the teacher’s desk. (Mom always insisted you make out one for everyone in the class, even the kids you didn’t like, so it would be "fair.") In the lower grades, the teacher decorated the box herself, usually with white or pink construction paper. White was favored since then the hearts could be made in both pink and white, and on it in red crayon would be neatly printed the grade and the teacher’s name.

As you grew older the teacher would allow the best artist in the class to decorate the big box. It was an honor to encrust the box with layered hearts or tissue paper flowers, although some students always wanted input on the design.

One February art class closest to the fourteenth was always reserved for making Valentine cards for your mom and dad. Copious piles of white, pink, and red construction paper (sometimes black was added for a cool shadow effect) were plied into service. Sometimes the teacher purchased foil-like cupids or hearts to embellish each card, and lace paper doilies were always a favorite for backgrounds for mothers' cards. Some kids brought in magazine cuttings to further add to the decorative effect. Twenty-five children wielded twenty-five snub-nosed scissors, folding a red sheet in half and carefully reproducing the lopsided teardrop shape with the flat side that would open up into a really-truly heart. The more ambitious children cut odd shapes from the edge and the interior of the folded heart and what unfolded was a confection in "lace" design. These hearts, plain or cut-out, were layered with smaller or larger hearts and then stacked together permanently with the inevitable paste (the flicking paste brush sending bits of white everywhere, including on the clothing and hair of unsuspecting classmates) and cheerfully crayoned with greetings.

We also cut out hearts, again both the plain and lacy variety, to decorate the bulletin board at the back of the room or on the pivoting cloakroom doors, white or red scalloped edges surrounding our best designs.

Later, at home, you would happily hand the now-stiff hand-fashioned card to Mom and/or Dad with a proud "Happy Valentines Day!" and Mom and Dad would admire it and then set it on top of the television console or on the kitchen table, leaned up against the vase of flowers Dad had brought for Mom so everyone could see it. If you were lucky, Dad would take Mom out to dinner and you could come, too, although in most households this was postponed to the Sunday closest to the holiday. Still fresh in your Sunday dress or suit, you'd all troup out to a nice restaurant whene the waiters wore suits and there were cloth napkins instead of paper ones and white tablecloths.

In that Valentine afternoon at school, however, you had received your own haul. The Valentine box was opened and the cards distributed. A few girls shyly smiled at a few boys, and a few boys embarrassedly tucked special Valentines away. There was the constant squeal of a few girls who had received sarcastic comic cards from the few whose moms had not supervised their card purchases and were sticking their tongues out at the guilty, laughing boys. Afterwards, there might be cupcakes and punch or some chocolates Hershey kisses and then it was time to run home and show Mom your cards (after carefully anointing a chosen favorite classmate with that ultimate winter valentine, a snowball!).

"Conjunction Junction, What's Your Function?"

Now joining Conversation Hearts together!

There's also now a "to" as well.

Little Tokens of Love

Valentines Day is upon us again, its world done in colors of pink and red and a touch of lavender and white. Both the site Valentines Day at the History Channel and Story of Valentines Day relate how this "loving" holiday came to be—and no, it wasn't created by Hallmark Cards!

Here are just two Valentine customs from the past:

In Wales wooden love spoons were carved and given as gifts on February 14th. Hearts, keys and keyholes were favourite decorations on the spoons. The decoration meant, "You unlock my heart!"

In the Middle Ages, young men and women drew names from a bowl to see who their valentines would be. They would wear these names on their sleeves for one week. To wear your heart on your sleeve now means that it is easy for other people to know how you are feeling.

The longest-running Valentine tradition (besides a token gift of sweets or some memento) is the Valentines Day card. One hundred years ago, it was considered an special token of your affection if you made your own Valentine cards. Young men and women would spend evenings with a paste pot, red paper, white lace, and the enduring Victorian colored illustrations known as "scraps" to make Valentine cards for their favorite people. But a thriving business existed for "boughten" cards as well. In Victorian times lace-paper Valentines were the preferred missive. In the late Victorian era, a new type of card called a "comic Valentine" was printed. These were printed on cheap paper and featured rude caricatures of people emphasizing extreme body parts (long, warty noses, fat, etc). They were mainly sent by young men who thought the humor was funny and most contemporary publications had some not-so-nice comments to make about comic valentines—they asserted that "good, manly young men" would not think to buy such things.

Here American Greetings presents a History of Valentine Cards.

And here's the story of Esther Howland, "Mother of the American Valentine."

And since sweets and Valentines Day have gone together for more years than anyone can remember, here's a history of one of the most beloved of Valentine candies, Conversation Hearts from NECCO.

Remember Valentine Boxes?

It's funny, I don't. Not individual ones, that is, as narrated in these two stories:

Celebrating Valentine's Day the Old-fashioned Way

Love in a Box

I remember there being a huge box on the teacher's desk. It had a large slot so many of the small, store-bought Valentine cards could be crammed in at one time. After lunch the teacher would open the box and distribute the cards. As they got older, the boys, of course, sent borderline nasty cards (apparently Mom wasn't helping them choose anymore), which really annoyed us girls. We tried within the limit of our budget to get the cutest cards we could, and those "darn boys" just ruined everything. :-)

Some Hilarious Christmas Memories

Do note what site this is on. :-)

"The Ten Least Successful Holiday Specials of All Time"

Candlemas

From The Holiday Page:

...[T]his is really a very old holiday -- one that has its roots in astronomy. February 2nd is one of four cross-quarter days. It lies about halfway between a solstice and an equinox. Today's cross-quarter day was celebrated as Candlemas in England, where it marked the beginning of spring.

Try this old English rhyme -- "If Candlemas Day be fair and bright, winter will have another flight. But if it be dark with clouds and rain, winter is gone and will not come again."

Or here's another old saying -- "Half your wood and half your hay, You should have on Candlemas Day."

In Germany it used to be said that "a shepherd would rather see a wolf enter his stable on Candlemas Day than see the sun shine." A German badger was said to watch for his shadow. The National Geographic Society once studied the groundhog -- and found him to be correct only one out of every three times. One final note. It's supposed to be bad luck to leave your Christmas decorations up after today.

As you can see, the old English rhyme (and another, similar, Scottish rhyme) form the basis for Groundhog Day, which is chiefly celebrated in the United States. However, the folks in Canada also have a groundhog, Wiarton Willie. In the Southern United States, there is "General Beau Lee," who lives at the Yellow River Game Ranch in Stone Mountain, Georgia.

Stormfax's Groundhog Day Site contains more info about Punxsutawney Phil, the "official" groundhog, the Candlemas rhymes, and even some info about the Bill Murray movie Groundhog Day. And of course here is Phil's official site.

This is a Catholic page about Candlemas history and customs.

Circle Sanctuary's site covers all the different customs surrounding February 2, Christian, pagan, and secular.

More Voices of Christmas Past

About a month ago I wrote this post, about a CD of Victorian/Edwardian Christmas music. I commented on how the singers' voices sounded markedly different in those days (and not just to do with the technical aspects of the recordings).

Well, it turns out that George Nelson, the "proprietor" of The Antique Christmas Lights Museum site, also collects old phonographs and has added to his site two pages of links to .mp3s of late Victorian/Edwardian/WWI-era Christmas music recorded from his own collection of cylinders and disks. He comments about his amazement at these disks still being viable after being recorded without the use of electricity 100 years ago.

In listening to these recordings, you can not only hear the difference in singing styles and voices, but also, on the earliest recordings, hear the custom of announcing the name of the piece and the singer or orchestra before the music started. Nelson also has two later pieces, Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" and "Jingle Bells" from 1942, played on a 1918 wind up phonograph.

(I love looking at Nelson's site, no matter what time of year, because I love looking at the technology of the time. I am not too young to remember when my mother's electric iron and other appliances around our house had thread-wrapped electrical cords instead of the plastic ones with a groove in it like today, and I remember the old lights with their two-color wiring. There were still some C-6 bulbs in the attic when we cleaned it out and I forgot to bring them home, to my regret. For the longest time, my parents kept as a "spare" an old toaster—with the thread-wrapped cord—which didn't "pop." Instead each side opened like the door on a toaster oven and you leaned the slice of bread against the wires and then had to watch it to make sure your toast didn't burn.)