Today marks the shortest day, the longest night in our yearly calendar. I know I mentioned that one of our advent activities this season is to celebrate and understand the winter solstice. I've been reading up on the solstice and I've learned so many interesting things and I am just bursting to share so indulge me, please....
I don't know how much you remember from your junior high science class, but, basically we on planet earth are in constant rotation on a daily, 24 hour basis; our planet spinning around in a full circle on its axis creating day and night. Its day for you when your side of the spin is turned toward the sun and night when it is away from the sun. Just to help make your head spin a little more (ha ha) our planet is also in constant rotation on a yearly basis, taking 12 months to make a circle (okay ellipse) around the sun. This, along with the way Earth tilts as it rotates, is responsible for how much light hits the northern part of the Earth and how much hits the southern part on a daily basis. This change in how much light from the sun we receive is what creates our different seasons. On the winter solstice, we in the northern hemisphere are tilted away from the sun and the sun has reached is lowest and southern-most point in the sky giving us the shortest amount of light of the entire year.
Now why is any of this of interest? Well way back when people were actually trying to figure out the world through observation rather than school and books and iphones, and life was just generally more precarious, having the sun reach its lowest point and face long, dark days was a very scary thing. Interestingly, the actual Latin root meaning of solstice is "sun stood still" because the sun pretty much ceases to move for 6 days in December, right around the solstice, appearing to set and rise in nearly the same spot. And being the keen observers they were, the ancients were concerned that the sun wouldn't move again, leaving them in a state of darkness with plants unable to grow, cold seeping in, and life around them dying.
Festivals celebrating the solstice were born out of this fear really, born both to thank the sun and to cajole it into continuing to shine to light our way and our ways of life. Religions and spirituality then were completely tied to Earth and to its constantly changing nature. And though we today have the luxury of being fairly divorced from this type of thinking and direct observation about the world around us, I think it is really interesting to point out that regardless of specific religion, nearly all the ways we celebrate the holidays around this time of year contain traces of ancient solstice celebrations. Here are a few connections I loved:
-Romans 2,000 years ago celebrated the shortest day with merrymaking and by decorating their doors with evergreen wreaths to symbolize that spring (and green growth) would return.
-Miseltoe, called "all heal" was an important good luck plant used in solstice celebrations by Druids.
-In Sweden, for the festival of light called St Lucia, girls wear crowns of evergreen and burning candles to help "rekindle the sun's fire"
-The twelve days of Christmas originates with the 12 "intercalary days" honored by the Romans linking the solar and lunar calendar cycles.
-The word yule is not only shorthand for this time of year but is also a large log set afire to "teach" the light to return.
I think I am eager to celebrate the solstice because it is such a direct way to acknowledge how miraculous the workings of the world are. The complexity of the sun and the earth locked in this dance of movement that gives us all life and rhythm and variation. It's beautiful and scary and completely out of our control. I love the idea of reveling in this and letting myself enjoy this super long day of darkness and reminding myself that the light will return. Tomorrow will be just a little bit lighter, a little bit longer.
HAPPY WINTER SOLSTICE EVERYONE! I am hopeful that in your own life and family you will take a moment to honor this unique day by turning off your house lights, lighting a few candles or a big fire, and opening your door, if only for a second, to the deep darkness outside.
p.s. I loved all the above books-good for me and the kids. I would absolutely recommend all of them.
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