I engaged in 5 days of big feasting with a lot of beer and a lot of mead. We were drunk. Oh how we were drunk. The best part of Yule season in Australia is that it's summer and hot out at night so walking up into the bush mountains and drinking under the stars is very pleasant. Minus the mozzies. -.-
christmas in summer? that must be weird. do you aussies put out fake snow and wintertime decorations? is your santa claus all bundled up? I bet the american version of christmas is infesting all the other cultures' christmasses.
I'm originally from Germany so I'm used to a white Xmas, but the good thing about summer Xmas is if the kids get bikes or outdoor toys they're outside in the morning. I dunno, it's fun watching kids have fun. Totally not a creep or anything. >.> But I remember celebrations in Mittenwald where I got a new riding saddle and I was like "thanks daddy!! I'll use this.... In 4 months!!!!" And yes there are the people that have fake snow tree and stuff as decorations.
Same way we do every year... meeting up with some local friends, having a good dinner and just being glad that we're together. Sometimes we have a ritual before dinner (depending on how the littlest of the kids are doing), sometimes we sing songs. We always have a fire in the fireplace. We used to do a gift exchange, but last year we all decided to make donations to charities instead in each others names. We've all got too much stuff anyway -- why buy more stuff for each other that we don't need? We all grew up with Christmas, so we still have the tree and Santa and presents at our homes on Christmas Day (although some families we know do it on Yule instead), but we try to focus on the seasonal, spiritual parts on Yule.
Yule is a old Germanic holiday. Honestly I don't get why people other than the religion of Germanic heathenry/Odinists would even celebrate the holiday. Odinism is pretty well a folk religion. Though to each their own I suppose. I know the wiccans have pretty well turned it into their own holiday so i'm surprised they don't just rename it. Wicca celebrates a different god than the germanics do so its like a separate thing. Anyways as for when to celebrate yule. Its a personal choice I guess, but if I were in the southern hemisphere I would celebrate in the souths winter. Yule was meant to be a winter holiday and the old calenders were season based. I know nothing of the way the stars or w.e move down there, but it seems like it would make more sense to celebrate the opposite time of year. I think that would be an interesting thing to think about.
Christmas trees, as with almost every tradition of christmas is pagan based anyways. So it makes sense to have a tree and such.
All beings are one spirit, a spirit embodying Nirvana neither existent, nor non existent coming to know itself most clearly like the sunrays make lights through holes in the roof its kind of exciting, will a little sprout one day peak up through the cracks in the floor? when will this house be dust? when will we again know nothing? when will I get a job? all of these are questions the river is asking and answering wssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh i am the ecstatic river sea water spirit frozen and flowing in the body i am the divine life from Aoen and norn communing in simple pleasure on the open grassy growing place the winter is a bunyon for my easy going forest witticisms i make mud out of the dirt, I am a friend of life, a muse for my fluidity but I am different, life is yang to my yin, I begin in the end primal energy, wooing my beloved as the universe with my dances, i am like a bird sometimes i know, coarse flight, coming from the wind, in rain, in snow, in spirits of plenty, ride me, for I am the love wrapped up gently within every mushroom which is a beaker for the elixir of the hill folk, and random are their ways, the magic ones, speaking and flowing through, they are the water too, come to the water to reflect an off trail dropping tomatoes and fruits the deer behind running, the bodhisattva in the trees i waited, feeling many things, I waited, losing my life with every rustling leaf, the language of the hill is vague makes an impression somewhere deeper than marked thought I whisper to the wind her name, it fills me with such joy, I know the beloved is there perhaps a fairy, or an elf has found me, it is her, I know, it is that magic, she is the land, she is the colors, she is the senses, deep is our union, and it is the origin of this world like the tree, i remember as a child there was the tree, on the side of everywhere, where things sprouted, at the picnic the ants come upon their noble way a smile to them, strange and beautiful keepers of the small way, and all woodland insects alive with the vibrance of true harmony, the woodlands are a symphony, though winter now has come out there i am drawn, and feeling naked and exposed, I work less mischief than before, I see there is no difference everything is nature, the woods will never go, because we are them, and the magic is in us
Most of my in-laws celebrate Christmas, and it's a big celebration, so we usually just eat a nice dinner at home for Yule and celebrate Christmas with the rest of the family. In my husband's and my minds, if you're not surrounded by little nieces and nephews it's not a holiday, and the winter holiday is less of a specific date than an attitude held for a month.
