Mourning Moon

I read recently that some Native American tribes referred to the full moon in November as the "Mourning Moon". I'm not sure of the truth of that, but it surely is for me.

Sorry I haven't posted of late. I haven't had the heart for it. What I have been doing is a lot of physical labor. Working on my husband's home office and working with my animals. Two weeks ago we (my family and a neighbor's family) slaughtered 6 roosters for the freezer and there's some more that can go. I made a cold frame for the garden and a wood rack for the basement. It helps. The work is slow because I get tired so quickly, but it feels good to turn on a CD and lose myself in the work. Then I'm so tired I just crash.

The holidays are going to be tough this year. Halloween couldn't even cheer me up and its my favorite holiday. I found myself ranting to My Friend The Nurse the other day about how much I hate this season. I hate the holiday's usually, but this year its especially bad 'cause my mom used to make it her business to cheer me up. She loved the holidays--the music, the lights and everything. She would never turn anyone away from her holiday table so we had some surreal moments with some very unexpected guests (including her ex-husband and his wife). We even had a memorable one where I brought a bunch of my friends to dinner and we called it the "Religous Joke Dinner". As in "Two Jews, a Pagan, and a Taoist go to a Welshwoman's house for dinner..."

My mother could never understand why I was such a grinch, but her experences as a child were just so different to mine. She came from a background of deprivation, so Christmass was a welcome time of abundance. Now we live in a world of abundance. The excesses and the expectations just make me crazy. I'm reminded of the orange she used to put in our stockings. When you can have an orange anytime you want, it just doesn't have the same impact.

Because she grew up in Cardiff in WWII, she never saw the streets lit up at night until she was 9 or 10. She told me of the revelation she felt at that moment and her face took on the delight I see in my own children.

We are not Christian so the holiday doesn't have that religious significance. We have a tree and do the gift thing as a celebration of the Winter Solstice, but that's all. And really that's all. Last year we sang carols with my daughter's singing group, but more out of the love of singing.

I think I'll see if the rest of the family wants to see a movie Christmas Day.