Io Saturnalia, amicis! We hope you’ve been partying hard in honor of Saturn, Roman god of regeneration and liberation. This weekend saturnine Emily made her annual hometown pilgrimage to shop and say hello to Murphy of O’Hurley’s General Store. And Lord of Misrule Monica is also back home - making her way through every jar of giardiniera in Chicago!
And of course we’re both excited about winter solstice this Wednesday, the shortest day / longest night of the year. How are we celebrating? Umm…
Monica: [busy eating tacos and ice skating in the city] (You can follow her Chicago adventures on Instagram though, and she’ll return soon with words of solstice wisdom.)
Emily: Longer days start soon! I’m not entirely sure how I’m celebrating winter solstice and Christmas this year - though my Yule log cake tin is calling to me! “Uncertainty” feels like my holiday theme. I’m keeping an eye on the weather and covid tests to see what family gatherings will be like. Lack of firm plans always makes me uncomfortable, but I know that when we can safely gather there will be fun and love.
On my mind, related to Saturnalia and uncertainty: how okay are we with disruption? Can we let go of certainty? This time of year I see lots of pop-history articles about Christmas, with a common theme that Christians took over pagan holidays like Saturnalia. Short version: the connections between winter holidays are messy as heck. (Longer version courtesy of a fave historian.) Truth is more always more complicated, and it can be difficult - even painful - to stay open to ideas that contradict comfortable stories and pervasive beliefs.
So, my winter solstice wish: May we all become better friends with uncertainty and the possibilities it makes available to us.
Signing off this winter solstice countdown with Rainer Maria “Live the Questions” Rilke:
You, darkness, of whom I am born-- I love you more than the flame that limits the world to the circle it illumines and excludes all the rest. But the dark embraces everything: shapes and shadows, creatures and me, people and nations -- just as they are. It lets me imagine a great presence stirring beside me. I believe in the night. Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy