The voice, the pen

I have often noticed how, what one feels, another thinks. Why, then, should we not share those thoughts and feelings? It might make things clearer for all... Here, I am offering snippets on whatever gets me thinking, with the intention of sharing these moments with you, hoping for a dialogue of sorts. Whether a word, a sentence, a whole text, please, share.

Tuesday 27 December 2011

'Tis the season


We often talk about the different seasons, identifying their characteristics, separating them from the rest of times in the year. We even make up seasons, like the holiday season around Xmas and New Year’s, which stand well defined from any other.

But, why do we need to do so?

The year is a cycle, a turn of the planet around a star. Both the planet and the star are in constant change, constant movement, so they don’t really care all that much about a couple of bells or a number on a calendar. So, too, is the satellite that rules flows and tides, but which never shows its back. The metamorphoses evident in Nature (alterations in temperature, in foliage, in the number and species of animals around, to name but a few) happen gradually. Indeed, it seems that all that green appears all of a sudden, but the seeds, roots and shoots have been hard at work for months before we get a glimpse of them; the newborns have sometimes taken years to fully gestate; and even as one half of the planet shivers, the other one sweats.

So, once again, why do we need to mark the separation, rather than observe the connection?

As our social groups have grown, so too has our insecurity about the other. We can know exactly where we stand within our family, our group of friends and sometimes our work environment. Yet, as these former clans expand, our knowledge of the individuals within them diminishes. Our need to respond, belong, be and receive love stirs and shakes, for we shackle it, afraid of bestowing it upon unidentified enemies. Still, it will out, whether we want it to or not.

Enter the ‘celebration’, the ‘season’, the ‘giving spirit’, the ‘good will to all’, ‘Xmas’, or whatever you would call it. A period when to watching ‘feel good’ films, giving presents, smiling at strangers and being merry for its own sake are not only allowed, they are compulsory for a very short while. This is nothing new, easily recognised in the ancient Dionysian rites, the Bacchanals, Purim, Carnival… (sorry, my knowledge is too limited to give more examples). Each such festivity gives carte blanche for otherwise ‘socially unwanted’ behaviours to be acknowledged and explored. As those beautiful verses (first in Ecclesiastes, then in a song) claim, ‘to everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose’. Pity, having mistaken those words to mean that seasons, times, purposes, etc. cannot intermingle, belong with each other, coexist even.

I’d say it is time, yes, to do away with the need for seasons. If Scrooge could vow to celebrate Xmas all year long, living ‘in the Past, the Present, and the Future’, why can’t we? Why can’t we just be a bit more daring, a bit less scared, so as to pursue happiness, generosity, community and merriment despite the change in date?

Maybe I won’t call it Xmas, and maybe you will, but we both know ‘tis the season. We all know that today, right now, ‘tis the season for loving.

Because the season is every day.