Celebrating the Winter Solstice

[horo04]

I have completed the Winter Solstice Reading for BetterMost in the four posts below, and I invite your comments and interpretations!!

I'm very surprised Lee! I didn't know you had an interest in Wicca or paganism.  I have been into Wicca for awhile now....now I just gotta find those Brokie Tarot cards you made.

[Jeff Wrangler]

Today is the Winter Solstice.

The older I get the more I get a feeling that there is truly something sacred about this day. 

Happy Holidays to one and all! 

[serious crayons]

Thank you, Jeff!

One thing I love about this day is that it's a turning point -- this is as dark as it's going to get, and from now on the days will keep getting longer and brighter.

Of course, it's also going to get colder and snowier before it gets warmer. But in winter, you have to grab onto whatever hopeful thoughts you can.

I suffer from a touch of SAD. I tend to feel a little down after Labor Day, and upbeat in the spring. I also gain weight in the fall and early winter, and often lose some in the new year. (Of course, it's hard to separate how much of that weight gain is light-related, as opposed to birthday-, Halloween-, Thanksgiving- and Christmas-related.) And when I do something outside on a sunny winter day -- or even drive in my car with the moon roof open -- I can really feel the power of light improving my mood.

[Jeff Wrangler]

Thank you, Jeff!

'Welcome, I'm sure!

One thing I love about this day is that it's a turning point -- this is as dark as it's going to get, and from now on the days will keep getting longer and brighter.

Something like that probably has something to do with my growing sense of the "sacredness" of the day. I also find myself wondering how deeply into the human past knowledge of such natural phenomena as the solstices and the equinoxes actually goes. Who figured this out, and how did the knowledge spread? I mean, how do you calculate something like this is the "shortest" day of the year when you don't have clocks? How long did it take someone to figure this out? 

I suffer from a touch of SAD. I tend to feel a little down after Labor Day, and upbeat in the spring. I also gain weight in the fall and early winter, and often lose some in the new year. (Of course, it's hard to separate how much of that weight gain is light-related, as opposed to birthday-, Halloween-, Thanksgiving- and Christmas-related.) And when I do something outside on a sunny winter day -- or even drive in my car with the moon roof open -- I can really feel the power of light improving my mood.

I generally manage to hold off the SAD till after the holidays. The fall is generally such a busy time of year for me, and then comes the holidays with their own busy-ness and lovely traditions to keep me occupied, or preoccupied. I have tended to bottom out after the holidays. These past few years, however, the depression hasn't been as bad is at times in the past. I'm thinking that perhaps somehow I've just managed to keep myself busier these past few winters and therefore just distracted myself.

Incidentally, I've never been clinically diagnosed as having SAD, but I've sure seemed to have symptoms, so I just assume. One reason I bought a home high up in a highrise building and facing south: I crave that sunlight.

Heh. I think it's probably humanly natural to put on weight in the fall and early winter. Some ancient "race memory" from our ancestors--maybe even with a genetic component--to "feast" in the fall when food is abundant to store up fat for the winter.

[Jeff Wrangler]

I did something new this evening.

Technically it was after sunset when I got home from work this evening, but there was still some light in the sky. I decided to light a bayberry candle in honor of the solstice, and let it burn down. This is something my family does on Christmas Eve. I don't know why I felt compelled to light this candle this evening, but I did feel compelled, so I did it.

The candle is in a pewter candleholder, and the candleholder is sitting on a pewter plate to catch any drips.

[Front-Ranger]

Happy holiday, friend! Bayberry is a most relevant way to celebrate!

[Shakesthecoffecan]

Regaining the sun from those down south.  Happy Solstice everyone!

[Oregondoggie]

Included this in some holiday greetings....

Winter Solstice

Brokeback Mountain lies written now in drifts of snow.

Listen! 
It is read by the biting wind.
It is lit by the Northern Lights
corralled by Heath on the slopes of Heaven.
 

[Front-Ranger]

Wonderful, O-doggie! Thanks for sharing!

[delalluvia]

It was a beautiful day in my neck of the woods.

I wore yellow, all my amber jewelry and gold sun motif rings and earrings, dabbed on some "Sol Invictus" perfume I have.

My sister won some tickets to an ice-sculpture exhibit at a local resort so we drove out there.  This resort had some sort of 'freezer' exhibit hall were they'd created a storyscape of 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas' in ice sculptures.  It was amazing.  We were given parkas, they had a snow machines - reminded me of Edward Scissorhands - that had snow drifting through the cold air and an ice slide.  It was an amazing exhibit.  Unfortunately, they had a manger scene in ice just as you exited with recorded announcements about 'our god'    Oh, well, can't have everything.  But the creche scene was beautifully done.  

Then my sister treated me to supper and later that night, we drove through the rich neighborhoods to look at the Xmas lights, saw the horse-drawn carriages with people being given tours (I've always wanted to do that with friends or a SO.  Wrap up, take a horse-drawn carriage tour and drink champagne...someday...).

The lights were just beautiful.  All in all a very nice way to celebrate the day.