Kia ora Koutou, a few rituals on the horizon. We’re approaching Christmas and thinking about how we’re going to celebrate it. As you all know I’m not a believer but I like the fact of Christmas, that its a day with our own rituals we’ve made or taken part in over a long time.
I’m thinking about it early this year because things are changing. I’m not entirely happy with this because one thing I’ve discovered about myself (and we all know this feeling) is that I’d like things to remain the same.
I like the same food, the hot glazed ham, the salads, the new potatoes, the trifles, the pavlova, the fruit salad, the chocolates. I know its because it only happens one a year and is made easier because I’ve paid into a Christmas Club.
I’ve told you about the feeling before. That moment when you pay for all these groceries, the mountain of them sitting in the trolley, hundreds I think dramatically, (yes all right), but then I whip out my Christmas club card and woohoo, sll paid for without a cent going out of my current bank balance. I know, I know, that’s because it’s been slipped out surreptitiously, twenty dollars at a time, throughout the year but for those three weeks in December when I start thinking about the day it seems like some good fairy (I’ve been called worse) has supplied the money without me knowing about it. A present from me to me.
Its like that feeling when you stare at the pile of ironing and think, ‘Why not?’ Then you look around and some devil’s voice, says, ‘Go on, go on.’ So you do and after a time of wonder the house is clean and you get changed into clothes that look like you’ve never a done a tap of work all day. You make a cup of tea, and you sit in the alarmingly tidy room and pretend the elves or a group of fairies came in and did the work.
This is a hangup I think from the fifties in my case, but it started long before then according to my theory.. This is that when settlers came over and discovered, surprise, surprise, that no-one wanted to clean their houses, and they had to do it themselves, they had this pretend thing going on. They could dress for the housework in a certain way, then once it was done, they’d change into clothes that looked liked they’d never done a tap in their lives, make a cup of tea, and for a few minutes know what it was like to be the Duchess of Devonshire with maids and ‘tweenies’ to do the dirty work.
So when I pretend that I’ve been given this magic card that pays for all the food in December, I’m really just carrying on an old tradition. I do it knowingly, my eyes wide open. Part of the rituals at this time of the year.
Why am I thinking of it weeks away from December? Because I reached my goal amount of money already and there are still a few weeks where I don’t put any money into the Christmas Club at all. And that glow is becoming part of the ritual.
You will have rituals too and some of them will be kicking in already as well. We are creatures of habit, true, but thank goodness we can rearrange or change anything we get tired of, or which no longer works for us. That’s part of the lead–in to Christmas too. I’m still going to do the ham (as long as someone with stronger arms lifts it in and out of the oven for me) but everything else is now done/organised by others.
And there’s another ritual I’m sure you know. This morning I changed the winter sheets for summer sheets. Immediately the temperature dipped sharply and the day became very cold. Why did I do it today? But I’m convinced it wouldn’t matter what day I did it. There is some strange connection between changing the sheets and temperature. I wonder if its a theory that NIWA has investigated?
Maybe I need to meditate.
