People who rely on the sun: take a minute with me here. I’ve been waiting for this day for weeks, as every year. Thank god the days begin to lengthen again tomorrow.
What a difference the margins make, even though the sun is still mostly with us even now. Those couple of hours off each end of the day by the time the solstice arrives make the light feel so sweet when it is here. Thus I’m celebrating. This is my holiday, right here.
I feel, despite myself, that my Christmas belongs to others this year. I am still learning to be at peace and, even, happy amid a certain self-sustaining ecosystem of injury and lack and complaint. Unless I’m on the Zócalo or Piazza San M. (as in recent Christmases), it becomes so easy to go to sleep round about the Yule. Holidays prime uncomfortable memories and evoke roles I want to have left behind. In the family zone, my relationships to people and to time become dull. I wrestle why-questions with myself: why would I even want to be conscious? Why struggle to stay awake, really be there for it? Why not just resign… forget myself? Mmmm, and resolve it's because losing consciousness is too easy. Because resigning is an insult to these goodhearted people. Because staying awake is an opportunity.
I will do my best.
But in any case, this is the holiday. This here. This!
Thanks, sun. Thanks, life on planet Earth.
I was thinking of staying up ‘til dawn with some pagans from my SS, but you who so disapprove of the company I’ve been keeping will be happy to know another idea is coming on. The Editor, who I never see lately, practices half primary on Friday evenings. (Actually he practices fourth series followed by a session of yogic flying, but when I am there he practices primary because you’re not supposed to yogic fly around people like me—the unenlightened.)
I’m thinking of going along tonight but doing a yoga mala or half-mala. Fifty-four for the 365 sounds about right, and maybe the other half in the morning: on the other side.
Don't forget, loves. Feliz solsticio.
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