Monthly Archives: December 2015

Dec 06 2015
2 Comments
Advent, Hanukkah

Enter the Light Bearers

Candlelight

Last night, with the Eve of St. Nicholas, we celebrated the first of the gift bearers, and tonight, Hanukkah begins. It is a moveable festival in the Jewish calendar, a festival of lights, this year the first of many nights where light is celebrated. And this is no surprise in this time of darkness, for we are fast on the approach to Midwinter: the longest night of the year. Light is what we seek.

Hanukkah commemorates an historical event in ancient Jerusalem in which a small flask of oil kept the lamp of the Temple burning for eight days and nights, much longer than it ever should have, long enough for a new supply of oil to be attained at a time when the prospect of attaining that oil looked bleak. This miracle of the oil is commemorated with each Hanukkah celebration through the lighting of the menorah, a candelabra of nine candles: one central candle and eight others, one for each of those eight nights.

Just as the oil of the temple lamp is central to Hanukkah, so is oil in the traditional foods of the holiday. Much of it is fried in hot oil. The most famous (and the ones that would get me to the table faster than anyone) are potato latkes and jelly doughnuts. The latkes are pancakes made from shredded potatoes, served with apple sauce and a dollop of sour cream. And any celebration that involves homemade doughnuts of any kind, be they jelly or plain or cinnamon, is no small cause for joy.

Our neighbor Old Aunt Sarah, who has been here in Lake Worth longer than anyone, doesn’t do much cooking these days, but some years, if the mood strikes her, she does make latkes for Hanukkah. Old Aunt Sarah’s latkes were the first I ever tasted. When she makes them, she makes them in large batches, and sends some over to Seth and me. We don’t see her often, but when we do, it is always a joy and a wonder, like the time she strolled over and peered over the garden fence and her gray eyes lit up when she saw the nasturtiums we were growing. “Nasturtiums!” she said, as she gazed upon those peppery blooms. She seemed transported. “I don’t think I’ve said that word since I was a child.”

It also happens to be, tonight, the Second Sunday of Advent, when we light two purple candles on our Advent wreath. Again, light increasing, for last week we had only one candle lit on our approach to Christmas, so tonight, that light is doubled. Old Aunt Sarah’s childlike wonder is central to Advent and to Hanukkah. We bring light, ever increasing light, to a dark time.  Old Aunt Sarah and we wish you that wonder. We, collectively––Aunt Sarah, you, me––we are the light bearers. It is up to each of us.

Image: “Candlelight,” a painting by Philippe Brouillard, 2015. [Public domain] via Wikimedia Commons.

 

Dec 05 2015
Krampus, St. Nicholas, The Gift Bearers

Enter, Again, the Gift Bearers

Postcard St Nick

The first of the midwinter Gift Bearers arrives on the 5th of December: St. Nicholas. He is a much older cousin of the American Santa Claus, but there are striking similarities. On the Eve of St. Nicholas, which is tonight, children throughout Europe place their shoes by the chimney before going to bed for St. Nicholas to fill with gifts, as well as set out carrots and hay for his donkey. Good children might wake up the next morning on St. Nicholas’ Day to find their shoes filled with fruits and nuts and sweets. He is the first of many gift bearers across cultures that wend their way through the midwinter darkness. He’ll be followed over the next few weeks by the Christkindl, by Father Christmas and Santa Claus, by los Tres Reyes (the Three Kings) and a kind old witch named Befana.

The Feast of St. Nicholas is celebrated on the 6th of December. He is sacred to countries throughout Europe, but especially to Russia, Greece, the Netherlands, Germany, and Italy (Bari, in particular, where his relics are kept at the Basilica di San Nicola). Nicholas was a bishop of Myra, in southern Turkey, in the fourth century. He is most famous for his generosity, and this, perhaps, is the reason he is connected with the bestowing of presents. One story that has come down through the ages tells of three sisters who were without dowries, for their father was very poor. The situation became so desperate that the father decided his only option was to sell his daughters into prostitution. Nicholas heard of the problem and took action: one night as the household lay sleeping, he tossed a bag of gold through the open window, and suddenly the eldest daughter had a dowry. In time, he did the same for each of her sisters, too. He bestowed these gifts in secret, until the third time, when the father of the girls caught him in the act. He was forever grateful to the good bishop, and thus the legend of St. Nicholas as a gift bearer began.

The Eve of St. Nicholas and its related traditions are, in some places, of greater importance than the arrival of Santa Claus on Christmas Eve. Santa is a relative newcomer compared to St. Nicholas. And one thing St. Nicholas has that Santa doesn’t is a dark companion. He goes by many names throughout Europe: Knecht Ruprecht, Black Peter, Pelznickel… but this dark companion is best known as Krampus. In fact, the 5th of December is known in some parts as Krampusnacht. Krampus is most often depicted with horns on his head, a very long tongue, and cloven hooves or sometimes one human foot and one goat foot. The punishment by Krampus is pretty harsh: he carries switches and rusty chains for the express purpose of swatting naughty children, and then he’ll stuff them in a sack or a basket and carry them off to hell. Serious stuff. And while the American Santa Claus has to do it all––reward good children with gifts and punish naughty ones with coal––you might think of St. Nicholas as a wiser man, a delegator: he gets to take care of the good kids, but he gives the task of punishing the bad ones to Krampus.

So do be good. St. Nicholas would love to fill your shoes with fruits and nuts and sweets tonight. And if you’ve been bad…. Beware the Krampus!

*

This is a slightly edited version of a Convivio Book of Days chapter that was first published on Krampusnacht, 2013. We learn so much from reader comments and here are two that were posted after the original publication of this chapter: Kelly O’Brien wrote, “I live in Germany & just experienced my first Krampus fest in the Austrian Tyrol region over Thanksgiving. It was terrifying! Not only do modern-day Krampus tout chains and whips, but parade through the village with torches and lots of other fiery devices. The costumes & masks were creepy beautiful, apparently a source of local craftsmanship pride. Do you think this is where ‘going to hell in a hand basket’ comes from?”

And Tad DuBois wrote, “I live and work in Germany and we went to sleep to howling winds last night and awoke to snow and ice. The neighbor’s kinder were all standing in front of their windows watching the snow fly (and no doubt hoping for school cancellations). At my office this morning St. Nicholas and Krampus have just visited. St Nicholas dispensed candy canes and Krampus had little bags of something dark, coal or reindeer turds perhaps (actually was dark chocolate molded to resemble bits of coal). To be truthful, the Krampus who visited seemed to be a mash-up of Eye-gore from ‘Young Frankenstein’ and Riff-Raff from ‘Rocky Horror.’ Still a wonderful tradition.”

The image above is from an old penny postcard sent to us by our good friend Linda Dailey in Maine. Is it St. Nicholas garbed in modern day clothing rather than his traditional bishop’s robes? Perhaps. And that, for sure, is a Krampus doll in his hands, just to remind us all to be as good as we can. Sweet dreams.

 

Dec 03 2015
Book of Days Calendar

Your December Book of Days

December Field

December now is here, carrying with it so many red letter days. There are the ones we all know, of course, but there are many lesser ones, like Santa Lucia’s Day on the 13th and St. Nicholas’ Eve on the 5th, not to mention the Twelve Days of Christmas that come on the heels of Christmas Day itself. Half of them are in the old year, half in the new, and this alone can be counted as one of the beautiful mysteries of the season, which stands outside of ordinary time. It is a month of gift bearers and light bearers in a time of wintry darkness.

And so it is a complex month, December. To help make it as meaningful as possible, here is your December Book of Days calendar. It is a printable PDF document, designed for standard US letter size paper. Print it and follow along as the Book of Days blog chapters are published.

The cover star this month is a snowy field, the front yard at my Aunt Anne’s house in Palos Park, Illinois, where Seth and I and the rest of my family gathered to spend Thanksgiving. The increasing darkness on the approach to Midwinter is much more noticeable in a northern place, and we had many snowy days there, as well. The scene above is what we awoke to on our first morning there. The snow was falling still late that same afternoon, and if you look closely (perhaps not even very closely) you can see the snowflakes that landed on my camera lens. The magic of a snowy field becomes quite apparent when you’re standing in its midst.

 

Newer posts →