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TWV Presents... Popular Pagan Holidays [Show all] Views: 5,329,642 Holiday: ... Autumn: The Croning Time The Hidden God: an Observance of Samhain It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Chri... Yuletide! The Holly King Presents Christmas's Pagan Origins Samhain: A Time for Introspection---and Activism Daily Goddess Awareness Well, You Don’t Celebrate Christmas... The Dark Half of the Year La Befana The Path to Avalon: An Inner Journey for Samhain The Halloween Witch: Sense of Humor or Sense of Ire The Holiday Season, The Constitution and What's REALLY Important What Is A Real Witch's Sabbat? Spiritual Aspects of Yule A Beltane Celebration The Beltaine Storm The Most Wonderful Time of the Year Virginia, Get a Life. Alicia Meets Grandmother Autumn: A Children’s Story Winter Solstice By Any Other Name For A Religion So Opposed to Paganism, You Sure Stole a Lot of Our Stuff! Supermoms’ and Superdads’ Defense Against “Holiday Kryptonite” Key Points of the Pagan Wheel of the Year Lughnasadh, The Ritual Mabon: Preparing the Celebration Mabon and the Coming of Autumn The Ostara Transformation A Story For Autumn The Solstice Flame: A Yule Story Yule Traditions, Old and New A Meditation on Samhain: How Lucky You Are. The Babylonian Ghost Festival Let Slip The Past, Free The Now: The Alchemy of Samhaine Samhain: The Ritual The Theme of Mabon Samhain: Learning to Release November Days Samhain The Celtic Origins of Samhain Ostara: Enter the Light! Mabon Equinox. Circa September 21st August: Celebrating The Harvest Honor The Father, Honor the Sun: A Summer Solstice Tribute Happy Interfaith Pagan Christmas Yule Holiday Season January: The Solitude of Winter Those Magickal, Mellow Days of Summer Solstice Swim at Beach 69, Puako, Hawaii Musings On October The Best Thing About Death Yule and Tarot: The Year in Review Connection To The Dead: The Meaning Of The Fall Season Samhain is Ablaze with Reflections of My Father First Thanksgiving... in China A White Christmas in Fuyang Imbolc...or As The Wheel Turns Holiday: All ... A New Pattern Glimpsed in the Holidays We Want them Back! (A Pagan View of the Holidays) A Beginner's Guide To The 8 Sabbats How to Get the Most Out of Your Year The Wheel of the Year: Round and Round She Goes and Where She Stops! Turning The Wheel By Choice Holiday: beltaine ... INDEX: Beltane Beltane -- Holiday Details and History You Call it May Day, We Call it Beltane In Praise of Pagan Men Beltane -- Enlightening Links Beltane Essay (4) Beltaine - Our May Morn Beltane: Return To Feeling Mother Earth and Sister Moon: A Beltaine Story of Creation Holiday: imbolc ... INDEX: Imbolc You Call It Groundhog Day, We Call It Imbolc Imbolc Regained: The Tale of Valentine's Day Holiday: lughnasadh ... INDEX: Lughnasadh Lughnasadh - Overview by Christina Holiday: mabon ... INDEX: Mabon/Autumn Equinox Mabon - Overview by Christina Mabon and the Harvest in Modern Times You Call it the Autumnal Equinox, We Call it Mabon You Call it the Autumn Equinox, We Call it Mabon NOTE: For a complete list of articles related to this chapter... Visit the Main Index FOR this section.

Article Specs Article ID: 13066 VoxAcct: 299957 Section: holidays Age Group: Adult Days Up: 79 Times Read: 2,453 RSS Views: 14,081 Virginia, Get a Life. Author: Angus Posted: November 22nd. 2009 Times Viewed: 2,453 Christmas is about the most pagan holiday there is. It's actually witchier than some of the other Wiccan sabbats. But don't go telling your family that. This little rant is not about the origins of Christmas, or the hypocrisy of Thanksgiving - it's about something else that unites them both, and irritates the hell out of solitaries. Thanksgiving and Christmas are not Pagan holidays per se, but we pagans are still forced to deal with them each year. The reason? (Cue dramatic theme music) Family... For 363 days out of the year you could disappear and nobody would look much, it seems. I mean, cut class and you'll get a bad grade; don't show up to work and they'll find somebody else; if your not home on your birthday your friends will leave a message, sung, way off-key. If you don't show up at the gym, well, that wouldn't be such a surprise - you never go there anyway. But for two days of the year your clan will hunt you to the ends of the earth, interrogate you like a war criminal, and incarcerate you with others. You just don't spend Christmas and Thanksgiving alone apparently, no matter what your professed patriotism level or Spiritual Path. Go ahead and try: Proclaim your freedom from our Country's checkered past, tell them again that your pendant is not the Christmas Star. Friends and family who have known you and your views for years will suddenly wink out and be replaced by the Attack of the Winter Holiday Pod People. It starts about 2-3 weeks before. Certain houses designate themselves attractor pods and begin trapping the stray singles. With a week to go the pressure mounts. Have they met quota? Do they have left over chairs? What about that uncle that nobody likes halfway around the world? Call him up! Fly him out! There are still a few folks out there who enjoy their own company. Find them! Hunt them down! They can bring the dinner rooollls..! There is something oddly transformative about the dark Wintertime crossing with Tradition. 'Transformative' in the zombie sense of the word. I mean they're talking with you, but they're just not themselves. The gates are down, the lights are flashing, but there just ain’t no train coming. "What do you mean you're not doing anything?" "I didn't say that. I said I have some puttering to do. I can pretend to watch the game on TV. I have a dirty Anne Rice novel. I'll be fine." Disbelief clogs their voice. "B-but you have to be with people!" "Oh. I'm not good enough for me, eh? Listen: I just don't feel this herd instinct to gather together on an ancient pagan holy day because Christ's salesmen adopted it for their own. And the fact that only a third of the pilgrims starved like rats and froze like popsicles does not seem to me like an appropriate party theme!" No response. The righteous, frankly, are not concerned with you. In the end, they are deaf to all but their faith. "No, " they chant, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Now you will accept an invitation; you will put on an uncomfortable, formal costume; you will pretend to watch the football game; you will have boring, stilted, deafening-silence-filled conversations with your family. You will eat unbelievably innutritious food; you will easily revert to sexist role-playing. You will CELEBRATE! Or I will let loose my army of flying monkeys on you!!! You, in a timid voice, the battle lost: "It's not a celebration when attendance is mandatory. (*sigh*) What can I bring?" The point I'm flying over here is that on the whole our humanity only seems to perk up on calendar approved days. That's not only irritating to those of us who choose not to play; it's also a low, sad, clarinet commentary on human nature. If it's true that we do love our friends and family then why can't we show it spontaneously, regardless of season or religion? And if we don't care for these people than it doesn't help anybody but Hallmark and Hickory Farms to perpetuate such periodic "joy". If the Western World's tarnished sleigh bells ring hollow to you this winter, then hide out from the holiday hoodlums. If I could take back three things I've ever said, one of them would be a myopic soliloquy I once gave: Opening presents with a housemate. She gets a bundle of cash in a Hallmark card from Dad. She's happy. I gaze off and wax that if he had spent a fraction of that to make her something special it would have been really special. I turn back to find her crying. Still, I have grown older, and colder with each shopping season. So here goes: Virginia? There is no holiday spirit. It's human spirit, and it can flower at any time of the year. So go ahead and send 'em a beefstick for Christmas. Give thanks that that the intolerant pilgrims managed to survive. But come the New Year, show up on their doorstop one morning with flowers, drums, games, friends, and all the makings for a wild breakfast. Then see which gift meant the most - to everybody. It's a weak celebration where attendance is mandatory. We are capable of so much less stress, and so much more joy. Angus McMahan angusmcmahan@gmail.com ABOUT... Angus Location: Santa Cruz, California Website: http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/angtime/ Author's Profile: To learn more about Angus - Click HERE Bio: Angus McMahan is a gregarious solitary who can usually be found playing strange drums strangely at various community seed rituals. He is a Lego sculptor, a cross-country marcher, a crop circle inspiration and a writer of no great renown. angusmacog.com Other Listings: To view ALL of my listings: Click HERE Email Angus... (Yes! I have opted to receive invites to Pagan events, groups, and commercial sales) To send a private message to Angus ... 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