There is a lunar eclipse this solstice. My dad has been dead for several years now, and he suffered from profound dementia for three years before that, so I feel like he’s been gone for a long time, but I imagine him this solstice, standing outside on the deck of the home he shared with my step-mother Faith. It’s on a hill on Orcas Island, Washington. He would have his telescope set up. He’d probably be wearing the dark green sweater I got him for Christmas one year, and the navy blue Green fisherman’s cap Faith bought for him, and maybe a scarf my mom knitted. He’d be fiddling with the scope, watching the moon and its earthshadow, writing notes in a tiny notebook, notes that would be hard for anyone but him to decipher later. Periodically he’d mutter “Goddamn it,” or, if grandkids were around, “Dang it,” if something didn’t go just the way he wanted. But he would love the eclipse.
Dad and Faith visited one time when there was a lunar eclipse and we all sat in patio chairs on the front lawn, watching it. One other time they came down when there was a comet visible. The three of us walked over to the nearby regional park with our binoculars and searched through the sky until we found it.
Love you, Dad.
Winter solstice is supposed to be a celebration of family and another turn of the wheel of the year. The “yule” log represents a wheel, that’s what dedicated pagans will tell you. I think it’s another excuse to drink wine and party. Don’t get me wrong. That’s a fine thing. I do, however, find myself thinking about family and friends this time of year, mostly family members who have moved on. It isn’t depressing. It’s a chance to think about them and the impact they’ve had on my life.
My mom died when I was twenty-seven. That’s actually fairly young to lose a mother, although I didn’t know that then. For a long time, most of my thirties, actually, I didn’t think I got much from my mother, other than her body type. In my forties, though, I started realizing that I inherited, or learned, a lot from her. She loved nature and collected things (a bad habit I’ve retained) so there were always little bowls of sea glass or bits of driftwood, interesting seedpods or colored rocks. I have her sense of humor. She was a quiet leader who could take charge when she had to, but preferred to be behind the scenes if she could. I can relate to that. I’m a better cook than she was, but it takes an effort, because I inherited, or learned, her complete lack of interest in cooking.
Mom was a devout Catholic. When she was growing up, the Vatican still put out periodic lists of books that it recommended good Catholics not read. My mother and grandmother awaited the list anxiously. They would get a copy (from their priest, I assume), sit down to look at the reason the Pontiff had “banned” each book, and decide which ones they were going to read first.
My mother liked to go to midnight mass on Christmas Eve. When I was a lot older I figured out that this was so Christmas day was uninterrupted. When I was a kid, it was just what we did. I was always in that languorous state of almost-sleep, inhaling the incense, my half-open eyes dazzled by the glow of the candles and the colors on the altar; green, red, gold. It was like a dream, a dream with music, and is the closest I ever came to feeling any mythological power during a mass. We would come home and my dad would read us the story of the birth of Christ from the book of Matthew (I think, anyway, it’s the one everyone knows, with no room at the inn, shepherds tending their flocks by night, and so on). We would hang up our stockings and go to bed. I don’t know why that rather ordinary ritual seemed infused with magic now, but it does.
On winter solstice, I try to find a few minutes to light a candle and think about friends and family. Sometimes I pick a handful of rosemary sprigs from the plant out front and weave them into a circle. Rosemary is not historically accurate for winter solstice I’m sure, but it’s pretty, and it smells beautiful, and Shakespeare tells us it’s for remembrance, so there.
I have actually gone to two big winter solstice rituals, performed by a famous local pagan writer named Starhawk. They were both interesting but just too crowded and kind of, I don’t know, canned? Commercial? Not satisfying, or at least not as satisfying as circle of rosemary and a candle.
Enjoy your solstice. If you have clear skies, enjoy the lunar eclipse on Monday night. If you can, seize Solstice night as a night of rest, since it is the longest night of the year. Light a candle. Dream of old friends and loved ones. Pause. Breathe deep. Reflect. Then get ready for Christmas, the new year and the challenges of 2011.