Guest topic deux from Sarah G. She’s a brilliant wit and wry life observer so I’m not surprised by “Obscure/invented holidays & creating new rituals.”
Who needs it?
Me. At some point in my late 20’s, I accepted the fact that my family sucked at things like holidays, birthdays, and observations of important life passages. By ‘accepted’ I mean I resented and blamed them for all of the disappointments in life as epitomized by their inability to effing show up at my junior high school choir concert.
And yet, I longed for them.
Why?
“The unexamined life is not worth living.” Go ahead. Argue with Socrates.
When you choose to create your own holidays and rituals, they’re meaningful. If marking our passages is mere habit, there’s other meaning. I’m not going to judge. No, really.
Hey! Why not blow raspberries on the bellies of things that I decide are important? Sounds like fun. Bonus: Making that choice also freed me to enjoy other people’s holiday rituals from afar. Like a zoo visitor coming across a cheetah out sunning itself with that big smug cat face. I feel delight at it’s pleasure.
X-Ms
Inventing Christmas – that was a good one to start with since I had a leg up. The world was already prepped to support my poor choices. Like the disco ball tree ornament I bought in Edinburgh. To this day, I love that damned thing. To this day, people humor me when it goes on my tree. Oh yes, I embraced the tree thing too. Pine! Inside your house! And no-one points out how you have a dead tree in your house all lit up and looking adorable.
The religious requirements or guilt trips generally associated with Christmas were zero in my incarnation. Instead, I opted for this cosmic consciousness-like good-will. There is a visceral sense of hope and love layered over all the complaining. I find that magical and it only happens at Christmastime. There are all these people everywhere trying their damnedest to be cheerful and kind and generous. Even miserable people who loathe everything about it wouldn’t be so vociferous if not affected. Flat-earthers who decry it as an excuse for rampant commercialism and blah, blah, blah. Yes? So what? Who cares? If that’s your poison, drink it. I’ll be over here sniffing that pine branch I conveniently placed next to my morning coffee chair while batting at that disco ball.
Just add horns and a 6-foot tongue
Krampus. That’s a great example. Yeah, the Austrians perfected it. Nope, no-one in Milwaukee, Wisconsin celebrated it until I decided it was our theme for a blow-out holiday party in 2009. Soon after the police were called on us, everyone in Milwaukee jumped on that bandwagon. I can retire that holiday wearing my Innovator Crown and move on secure in the knowledge that our Krampus party lives in legend.
People do it all the time
We all invent, morph or decide to consciously or subconsciously evolve old themes into something wonderful. It’s simple. Take the parts you don’t like and chuck them. Replace them with something you do like. Layer it over an existing holiday so that your friends ‘get it’. Heck, it worked like a charm for the church.
Friendsgiving. That’s a brilliant new-ish holiday mash-up. You get a bunch of people who really, really like each other together. Abandon the pressure to get together with a bunch of people who barely tolerate each other – we’ll call them ‘family’. You each bring a some favorite foods. Someone might cook a turkey for the sake of whimsical, nose-thumbing nostalgia. You spend the day together, eat the foods with your fingers and laugh your asses off. Perhaps a little D&D to cap off the evening.
It’s time has come
Taco Tuesdays have became ingrained in our collective consciousness. It taps our love for alliteration and is a delicious clarion call for abandoning steamed vegetables once a week. It universally answers the question, “So, when should we get together for dinner?” Next thing you know, it’s a fait accompli as we revel in chili seasoned beef and argue over crunchy vs soft shells.
Tacos as a metaphor for freedom of choice. Pass the hot sauce.
I’m Susan Scot Fry, the author of “A Life of Significance”. Honest, occasionally humorous and sometimes I swear.
A Year of Significance 