Plough Monday

Traditionally the first Monday after Epiphany, when the men headed back to work--in those agricultural days, their plowing.

(Who plows in the winter? Well, from what I understand, snow has always been called "poor man's fertilizer." After a light snowfall, the average farmer back then might hitch up his oxen or horses and plow the snow into the soil, adding nitrogen. This was also a practice of dryland farming, to capture moisture in the soil.)

St. Distaff's Day

Traditionally this is when the women got back to their spinning (hence the "distaff") and weaving after Christmastide. Wish I'd had the leave to take all Christmastide off--oh, well, got to go on vacation and see my mom instead!

I have the decorations in my cubicle traded out for winter ones: a green garland with silver threads to look icy, a bouquet of winter greens with a little holly to give it color, a vase of snow-flocked holly, and nice snowy winter pictures all around, including the January entries from old Linda Nelson Stocks calendars and two other calendar photos I have kept: a tree-lined approach to a red barn, all covered in snow, and a snowy stone mill, with the water on the millwheel frozen.

I have a small calendar picture of Boston I keep up all year round (especially during the summer) to remind me there are more civilized seasons. It's a shot of Beacon Hill, with the brownstones, cars, street, vegitation, and the cast iron fence covered in snow.

Wish it could cool off the hot flashes... :-)

French Hens or Virtues?

The Twelve Days of Christmas are probably the most misunderstood part of the church year among Christians who are not part of liturgical church traditions. Contrary to much popular belief, these are not the twelve days before Christmas, but in the Western Church are the twelve days from Christmas until the beginning of Epiphany (January 6th; the 12 days count from December 25th until January 5th).

The Twelve Days of Christmas (includes the supposed Christian meanings behind the different gifts).

In traditional Christian churches Christmas, as well as Easter, is celebrated as a period of time, a season of the church year, rather than just a day. The Season of Christmas begins with the First Sunday of Advent, marked by expectation and anticipation, and concludes with Epiphany, which looks ahead to the mission of the church to the world in light of the Nativity. The one or two Sundays between Christmas Day and Epiphany are sometimes called Christmastide.

Epiphany

"The Journey of the Magi"

by T.S. Eliot

"A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter."
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.


All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.

Twelfth Night

"On the twelfth day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...twelve drummers drumming
"eleven pipers piping
"ten lords a'leaping
"nine ladies dancing
"eight maids a'milking
"seven swans a'swimming
"six geese a'laying
"five gold rings
"four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

Or maybe not.

There are two schools of thought about how to count the days between Christmas and Epiphany. One school says that Christmas is the First Day of Christmas, which makes January 5 Twelfth Night, with Epiphany as a separate day.

The other school says that Christmastide is for merrymaking and that Christmas is a holy day and should not be included. So Boxing Day/St. Stephen's Day would be the First Day of Christmas, leaving January 6 as Twelfth Night. (This is talked about below in the link from Woodland School.)

Either way it means Christmastide is just about over. Time for the tree and the ornaments and the garland and the tinsel to start wending its way into storage for another year. (Yes, time for good old-fashioned post-Christmas depression.)

In England today one of the features of the celebration is a Christmas cake, a fruity, spicy concoction with white icing. Earlier tradition has the cake for Twelfth Night, which was an evening of merrymaking. An uncooked bean would be included in the cake and the person whose slice it was in became the leader of the festivities for the evening, deciding which games would be played. (Sometimes a raw pea was included, and the man with the bean became the king and the woman with the pea became the queen.) In some places little charms were baked into the cake for fortune-telling purposes. A ring meant you were to be married, a thimble meant a woman would remain a spinster, etc.

Traditional British Twelfth Night cake

Colonial Williamsburg Twelfth cake recipe

School of the Seasons' Twelfth Night page

Woodland Junior School's Twelfth Night page

This last is a great site, produced by a British school, about British customs. Here's the main link.

Eve's Day

"On the eleventh day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...eleven pipers piping
"ten lords a'leaping
"nine ladies dancing
"eight maids a'milking
"seven swans a'swimming
"six geese a'laying
"five gold rings
"four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

If you're wondering what Adam and Eve have to do with Christmas, it's not all that odd: it is said that the Christmas tree derives from the "paradise tree" used in medieval religious plays. Most of the population could not read, so Biblical stories were presented to them in the form of plays. The paradise tree was hung with apples or other fruit in illustrating the story of Adam and Eve--it's just a few steps from there to the decorations on the Christmas tree.

I can't remember where I was reading it, but it was in a discussion of best/worst liked Christmas songs; someone took umbrage to the line in "I'll Be Home for Christmas," "...and presents on the tree" with a sarcastic "What's that all about?"

Well, hon, way, way back people didn't give big gifts for Christmas (unless they were rich and had money to toss away on pony carts and diamond lavallieres). You received one or two gifts at most and gifts were usually for children. Stockings or a classic-sized Christmas tree (tabletop size) held the gifts--that's originally what the tree was for. (If the tree was at a church or school--many people in the 1800s didn't have personal trees but saw them at social gatherings--it might be tall to fit all the needs of the congregation.) Anyway, presents were hung on the tree, and so were cookies and fruits and boxes of candy. The fun of Christmas was getting to "plunder" the tree.

So, yes, "presents on the tree" is correct; the song was written during World War II, by someone who probably was old enough to remember the original custom.

Speaking of old customs, for history buffs Christmas in the Old West is fabulous. Republished are diaries, newspaper articles, magazine stories, and illustrations of holidays past. (By the way, the folks who think the use of the word "holiday" is a recent politically correct term to avoid saying "Christmas" ought to take a peek at this book. "Holiday" was used quite frequently in these 1800s/very early 1900s store ads, possibly because some of the older people and the Scots were still in the habit of giving gifts at the New Year, not at Christmas. "Holiday" covered both customs nicely.)

Adam's Day

"On the tenth day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...ten lords a'leaping
"nine ladies dancing
"eight maids a'milking
"seven swans a'swimming
"six geese a'laying
"five gold rings
"four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

Well, in our case it was Fred's day. :-) It was our annual New Year's [a bit late] viewing of Galaxy Quest. We first went to see it on New Year's Day 2000 and it's become a bit of a tradition.

I had a nice surprise today, my copy of Christmas in the Old West came today. I saw it at full price and blanched, then found a remainder copy for less than half price even with postage. It's not a history, but, as the author calls it, a scrapbook of holiday memories of the pioneers, starting with the trappers and continuing through the era. The last half of the book is sprinkled with ads and articles from period magazines, including my beloved St. Nicholas, which was part of the draw.

The biggest surprise was that I ordered it on Wednesday afternoon and got it today; what service!

Dancing Day

"On the ninth day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...nine ladies dancing
"eight maids a'milking
"seven swans a'swimming
"six geese a'laying
"five gold rings
"four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

We finished the last of the pumpkin bread we bought on vacation today with more than a sentimental sigh. We still have the sugarless candy and the chocolates from Sweenor's and the "analog" photos we took are at Sam's being developed, but the pumpkin bread somehow had come to symbolize those wonderful two weeks of freedom.

Nice to see a good smattering of folks who still have their lights and trees up. The tree on Northside Hospital and on Stone Mountain and in front of Lockheed presumably have their last hurrahs tonight before the workweek comes to sweep them away unless there are Christmastide devotees around.

St. Basil's Day

"On the eighth day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...eight maids a'milking
"seven swans a'swimming
"six geese a'laying
"five gold rings
"four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

Time for the Tournament of Roses Parade again...as always absolutely gorgeous. Apparently California is in the midst of a series of rainstorms--it rained two inches there yesterday, and the forecast is for rain the rest of the week--but the sun broke through today to present a perfect blue-and-gold day to march down Colorado Boulevard. Ironically, it was warmer here than in Pasadena: when we left the house at 1:45 p.m., it was 64°F here and only 51°F in Southern California. Bizarre.

I am presently in the midst of reading Brittney Ryan's The Legend of Holly Claus. I've been attracted by the cover since it came on the market, but beautiful covers do not a good book make. The reviews on Amazon were splendid except for one, so I splurged.

This is a wonderful book. If it was printed 100 years ago it would have probably been serialized in the pages of St. Nicholas magazine--it has that air of being one of the old classic late 19th century/early 20th century fairy tales written by people like L. Frank Baum and Frank Stockton. (In fact, it reminds me a little of Baum's Life and Adventures of Santa Claus.) The descriptions are breathtaking and if that wasn't all, there are absolutely exquisite pen-and-ink, meticulously detailed illustrations by Laurel Long. Like those old-time fairy tales, this book does not shy away from the ugly realities of life--no Barney the dinosaur/Strawberry Shortcake sweetness-and-light nonsense--and there are some deaths and scary transformations. Still, it is a beautiful tale for imaginative children.

Happy New Year!

Played Scrabble tonight for the first time in years and did respectably well. That was at our first party. The second was more crowded and noisy, but the company was wonderful. I used my new cell phone to call my mom at two minutes till midnight and counted down with her, and then everyone wished her a happy new year. I hope I cheered her up a bit. She was home alone tonight with a sore eye and a tongue aching from the radiation treatments.

Been watching Boomerang all day and evening--they're doing a Jonny Quest marathon again. They did one on Christmas as well. So we've had a "Jonny Questmas" and a "Hadji New Year"!

St. Sylvester's Day

"On the seventh day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...seven swans a'swimming
"six geese a'laying
"five gold rings
"four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

Been a busy day--got some things to take to the parties tonight, bought some groceries, visited Borders...am now home watching The Poseidon Adventure, which takes place on New Year's Eve/Day. For many years Fox Movie Channel has shown this film on New Year's Eve. One year they had the full-screen version, widescreen version, and a version with popup facts. Last year they showed it with a documetary about Poseidon Adventure fans.

This year there are other films on, in respect, I will assume, for the victims of the tidal wave in Indonesia. The photos and stories coming from that part of the world are heartbreaking. If you're an Amazon.com customer and are looking for a quick way to give the relief effort some help, you can do a one-click payment via Amazon. Or visit www.redcross.org.

Thursday Threesome

::Taking the Lights Down...::

Onesome: Taking-- --some time off? Are you on holiday schedule tomorrow? ...or is it just another day in the mines? How about a party in the evening? No?

When a holiday is on a Saturday, you get the Friday off where I work. But since I had Friday off anyway, I got Thursday off as well...and then we had the power failure on Wednesday which sent us home before noon. So even though I had to work this week (I had no leave left, after taking two weeks of vacation), it was a nice short one! (It's actually not bad working between Christmas and New Year's...no one else is at work! You bring a book and enjoy yourself.

Twosome: the Lights-- Hey, is this the weekend all the decorations come down? When do you "de-Christmas" your place?

After January 6th, which is when the twelve days of Christmas are over. This is the feast of the Epiphany, when it is said the Wise Men reached the location of the Baby Jesus.

Threesome: Down-- --time... Are you getting any relaxation time this weekend? ...or are you all wrapped up in parties and events? ..and for the students: are you done with down time? When do you have to go back?

We have two New Year's Eve parties tonight, but hopefully it will be fairly quiet afterwards. We have to rest--we have a Twelfth Night party next Saturday.

Churching Day

"On the sixth day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...six geese a'laying
"five gold rings
"four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

The titles that I'm giving to the Twelve Days of Christmas, BTW, are from a novel called The Thirteen Days of Christmas, a medieval tale about a wealthy man who gives his intended bride the twelve days of gifts (no, this isn't the sarcastic version in letters) to convince her he's not staid and unimaginative. The children in the Kitson family conspire with the suitor to get their bossy sister Annaple married off because they hate her cooking! It's very funny.

Another visit to the past today: A Louisa May Alcott Christmas, short stories from various 19th century magazines. This volume cheats a bit--two of the stories are Thanksgiving tales, but the merrymaking is Christmasy enough. (There's another volume, A Louisa May Alcott Christmas Treasury, which purports to contain "all Alcott's Christmas stories," but only about half of the stories and poems are duplicated between the two books.) Alcott Christmas was marketed as a children's book, but at least two of the stories are adult domestic dramas with Christmas framing. The cover makes it look too cute for words.

St. Thomas of Canterbury Day

"On the fifth day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...five gold rings
"four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

A freebie today, as the power went out at work. I spent the blackout time reading Paul Davis' The Lives and Times of Ebenezer Scrooge. If you're a fan of A Christmas Carol, you'll enjoy this examination of how readers' interpretations of this simple book have changed in the 140 years since it was written. To the early Victorians it was a plea for charity at the Christmas season, to the late Victorians a celebration of family and children (up to the exclusion of Scrooge). In one era it was treated as a children's story, in another an indictment of economics. A great examination of changing social mores.

Childermas (Holy Innocents Day)

"On the fourth day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...four calling birds
"three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

Anyone interested in the history of Christmas customs in the United States should get a copy of Karel Marling's Merry Christmas! The history of Christmas customs has been chronicled in many other books, but Marling's fresh take is informative and interesting. Do you know why we wrap Christmas gifts, when the first gifts were actually distributed unwrapped and hung on the tree? Did you know those ubiquitious Christmas villages lit from within by electric bulbs weren't the creation of Hallmark or any other Christmas merchant, but derive from old European custom? Do you know how Santa Claus evolved from an aesthetic bishop to a "right jolly old elf" to the "six foot God Emperor of Christmas" (complete in red and white, Coca-Cola's colors)? Marling's book tells you all this, and more, from the evolution of "White Christmas" to the celebration of the holiday in foreign climes. Highly recommended!

Tuesday Twosome

1. Do you make resolutions and why (or why not)?

No, I don't keep them.

2. What two things do you want to change about yourself or your lifestyle in 2005?

Lose weight and get more sleep.

3. What are two important events that occurred in your life in 2004?

It'll have to be four: My budgie Bandit died, I had surgery to remove an ovarian cyst and had a hysterectomy, I adoped Pigwidgeon, and I bought a new car.

4. If you could change two things/events of 2004, what would they be?

Most importantly my mom's cancer not getting worse would have been the best thing to happen.

That dippy woman in the SUV who hit me could have slowed down and missed me, too.

5. Are you going to "Partay" on New Year's Eve or just "chill"?

"Partay" with friends, but most of us don't do that drinking thing, and those that do, don't do it to excess. I don't even know if I could drink, even if I liked to, because of my heart pills.

St. John's Day

"On the third day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...three French hens
"two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

I finally had a chance to put on my "Happy Holiday Hearth" DVD tonight. This is a version of WPIX's beloved "Yule Log" with a fire crackling onscreen. You can watch it with the fire crackling, with Christmas carols, or with both.

There are several versions of video fireplaces, of variable quality. This one is pretty nice; generic singers doing the carols, pretty traditional. There's one fireplace set that actually has non-Christmas music to it so you can use it all year 'round.

I was ambivalent about the existence of video fireplaces, but I kind of liked it last night as I was reading, with the crackling of the fire in the background. It must be a visceral, instinctive thing, being attracted to the snap and crackle of the flames.

(Of course I could go upstairs and listen to the real fire, but it leaves Pidge alone; I spend so little time with him weekdays that I hate to do so.)

Monday Madness

1) Which holiday do you celebrate this time of year? (If necessary, modify the following questions to suit your holiday.)

The Christmas season, through Epiphany. (And Advent, of course.)

2) Do you begin shopping for gifts earlier than Thanksgiving, looking for the perfect gift? If not, when do you begin?

I shop for gifts all year long. I know what the people whom I buy presents for like and when I see an appropriate gift, I buy it.

3) Do you only purchase gifts that you know are perfect for the recipient and if you don't find that gift, do you just get anything?

I still try to get a gift that's appropriate. I had particular trouble with one friend this year, but found something in that person's sphere of interest at the last minute. I would have preferred something a little more personal, but this was quite close.

4) Did you receive or give any "obligatory" gifts this year?

I dunno if it's an obligatory gift--the nice fellow who cuts our lawn gave us an amaryllis plant. I wish he wouldn't; I killed the one he gave us last year. We really don't have anywhere to keep it and I'm allergic to flowers.

5) Do you decorate your tree as evenly as possible or do you skip the areas that are not visible?

I put the older ornaments in the back of the tree. (You can tell; they're faded.)

6) Do you like multi-colors on your tree or do you prefer monochrome?

The tree and front door wreath are multicolor; the rest of the lights are blue. Both James and I love the ethereal look it gives to the house. If we ever get a plug put into the front of the house we can put up more lights...

7) Did you bake "traditional" cookies, frost them and decorate them? or did you cheat and buy the ready to bake kind? (like I tried)

Frosting? Ugh! I did make traditional cookies, Italian wine biscuits. This is what my mom used to bake, along with almond bars and molasses cookies and butterballs. The butterballs had powdered sugar on them; that's as sweet as we got. (Frosting...shudder...)

8) Are you the host of a holiday gathering? which one? family, work, friends?

We have a Twelfth Night party on the closest Saturday to January 6. I've never done the cake, though. (You're supposed to put a bean in it and the person who gets the bean will have good luck throughout the year.)

9) With whom do you spend the holiday?

Sometimes we are invited to friends' homes, but this year we had Christmas on our own. We went to see James' family on Christmas Eve.

10) How did the holiday turn out? Perfectly? funny mishaps? miss anyone?

We had a nice quiet day which was quite relieving for this year! We had vacation at Thanksgiving and the week after and then two weekends where we did nothing but run off our feet doing errands and repairing things. We slept late, had presents, spent a quiet afternoon with the animals, had turkey for dinner and made turkey soup.

Boxing Day/St. Stephen's Day

"On the second day of Christmas
"My true love gave to me...
"...two turtledoves
"and a partridge in a pear tree."

We ended up not going down to the Fox at all. We had the usual weekend errands to run since we'd played hooky for the rest of the time. The usual tiresome run for groceries, of course, and the ubiquitous washing of the clothing. But now we have Christmas cards for next year and have stocked up on some soda for our Twelfth Night party.

We discovered that if we want to see the World War II exhibit at the Atlanta History Center, we're going to have to make tracks there next Sunday since the Center is closed New Year's Day. January 2nd is the last day.

Looking a the calendar and watching those last few days of 2004 clock down.

Sigh. Another year gone...

Anticipation is the Best Part...But Can't We Make It Last?

I found this beautiful passage in Kate Seredy's The Open Gate:

Christmas never comes all of a sudden. It shouldn't. It has to be hoped for and waited for with joy. It is like a beautiful, bright, glowing comet that one can see from very far away. It floats closer and closer, growing more beautiful as it comes. The few days before it finally envelops the whole world in a shining, warm light are perhaps the best part of Christmas. They mean secret smiles at bulky, strange objects trying to hide in closets and under beds, or anywhere, where people are not supposed to look, but, because it's Christams, always do. They mean wonderful, spicy odors all through the house. They mean whispered conversations that suddenly stop when one comes into a room unexpectedly, and the bubbling feeling inside one that comes from the knowledge that there is another surprise being talked over and plotted with such secrecy that one can't help but know about it. That is the best part of Christmas; the waiting, the preparing, the hoping for the joy to come."

We wait so long for this time of year--why rush it when it comes? As Kris Kringle said in Miracle on 34th Street," Christmas isn't a day, it's a state of mind. But yet somewhere tonight trees are being undecorated and "Christmas is over."

What happened to letting the Christmas season at least go through New Year's Day? Even the stores tear down their decorations where they used to last until New Year's. There are twelve days of Christmas, and, even though most of us poor working class drones must go back to work on Monday, why not keep the season going as it should and parcel a bit of fun through each of the days? Enjoy the decorations and the movies and the scents and the colors and the plays of the season! It's all yours to celebrate--don't let it slip away so easily!