and I were chatting about the Autumn Equinox the other day and how we mark it and I shared what I always come back to. I think about our ancient brethren who had no fucking clue what was happening at any time. For real. Take a second and think about it. Imagine having no idea why anything does what it does and you have few resources (probably can’t read) to even seek info out. Were they maybe the happiest if smelliest people around? I think about this all the time, both what it must have been like to be in an information vacuum and how badly it must have smelled. I am literally a few sentences into this and already on a tangent….Back to the ancients, the origin of Equinoxes and Solstices was to mark and celebrate light. As most holidays and celebrations go in modern times it’s roots are in paganism.
If you were unsure if you would ever see the sun again exactly how hard would you party? Considering thanks to a lack of refrigeration and a love of fermentation people were drinking booze 24/7 in ye olden times, I imagine we’d all party pretty hard. The Equinox was a celebration of what you wanted to bring to light before it disappeared and what you wanted to bring into the darkness of winter. It was a time for giving thanks for the harvest and showing appreciation in hope that the light (sun) would come back. I get stuck on this every autumn equinox. Imagine going into winter not sure if the sun will ever return. New Yorkers every winter like to recreate this fear without half the fun or mead in my opinion fancying ourselves Persephone forced to return to Hades fearing we’ll never be allowed to see sun again. Somehow spring always comes, we all realize maybe we don’t hate our lives we just needed some sunshine on our faces and a new season begins. Maybe access to information has nothing to do with remembering.
If the sun was never to come back what would you want to be cocooned with in the dark? What would you wrap around yourself in the cave and hope it strengthens? When the sun returns in spring what seeds will you be ready to plant? If you know the answers to these questions I’d love to hear them.
Seasonal thinking makes sense to me, maybe we don’t need the internet after all.
xx. A
What I’m into right now:
Reading poet not actress Maggie Smith’s memoir and really enjoying it
Scrubbing the tan off with my beloved Korean mitts.
Soup! All of it! Do you have a great soup recipe? You better comment with it or a link plz! One of my absolute faves that you can riff on endlessly, I usually leave out the bulgur for example is this one by Heidi Swanson.
I am deep into my 90 Day Fiancé bullshit, and thankfully a new season of Love is Blind has also entered the chat, so I can fully question humanity. When I am not watching the finest escapism entertainment I’ve been into: this pod, re-watching Killing Eve, and enjoyed Michelle Wolf’s latest comedy special.
Tell me what you’re into right now and no joke if it’s soup related definitely share it.
Ep. 85 A Tarot Reading for Fall