New Moon and Midwinter Solstice

Here is The Sun about to emerge from a peak in the mountains behind my home. Camera could not capture the very subtle sundog rainbow that I actually saw but a hint is visible! This was a couple of days ago, just not quite perfectly on the solstice date although there was similar this morning as well. To my eye, there is so much power and promise in this scene.

For these two happenings--new moon and solstice-- to fall on the same day is unusual. It also creates a kind of double whammy from an astrological standpoint. It's said that the day before, the actual day and the day after a new moon are times to stop and assess, plan ahead and perhaps profit from past errors but not to begin new projects. There is much the same mystique about the shortest day/longest night of the year when the sun is farthest from us here in the northern hemisphere and then begins his long journey back to midsummer.

As a very sun-centric person, I do look forward to this date and the subtle shift in energies as I know the heat and light is coming back, albeit slowly. But I also realize it is important to honor and appreciate the dark and cold for they are part of the natural cycle and the turning of the wheel of seasons that still govern much of our lives even though we have come so far from the ancestors who lived directly off the land and were much more subject to the capricious whims of weather and seasons than we are.

Having spent a good bit of my life in situations where I had to be outside and working in all kinds of weather and closely associated with animals, I may sense all this more than some of my contemporaries. If one merely goes from climate controlled house to equally sheltered car and workplace and back. other than maybe dealing with wet or slick roads on a commute, it doesn't matter much. But to me it does and always will.

I have lived in primitive conditions where heat was only from the wood one gathered and cut to size for the stove, where water might freeze and pipes have to be thawed or even buckets carried to fill one's needs. That's humbling in many ways but also empowering for you learn you can cope and care for your needs or those of your family and animal friends.

Yes, I am looking back today, as I have quite a lot the past few months and years. But that does not mean I cannot and do not look ahead too. In mere weeks the first signs of spring will appear and I'll be alert to them. It's an exciting time with the promise that life truly does go on and after the small deaths of falling leaves and withered plants, animal hibernation and such, reawakening comes. That is encouraging to one who recognizes she's on the last ten or twenty percent of this particular life. There will be others in time as there have been others in the past!

It's no coincidence that modern Christian Christmas is so close to the ancient pagan celebration of the Solstice and that many things we associate with the Christmas season have roots far deeper than we might guess. That is good, in my humble opinion, for it creates a continuity between us here and now and our ancient ancestors. History, even the most obscure and distant, still has things to teach us. We are still humans and despite our many technological and scientific advances are not so very different than our caveman fore-bearers. We still eat plants and animals, albeit they now come in neat cans, boxes, and saran wraps and fire and water are still essential to our lives although they too mostly come to us instead of us having to go and make them available for our needs.

At any rate, I hope you will take a moment today to acknowledge the ancient realities are viable to this day and relevant to us, and to perhaps honor the spirits and energies that operate 'behind the scenes' for us as they always have and will. Whether you think of them as the Divine Being, the "Force" the Star Wars folk spoke of or the varied deities pagan folk recognized does not really matter.

Something is or maybe are and we should never lose sight of that fact or fail to recognize that we are but so many tiny ants going about our busy-ness and still subject to those Powers-That-Be whether we want to be or not. It's okay, it really is! It does not take anything away from us, for we are part and parcel of the whole Universe too and share in all that goes on; we just don't control and direct very much of it! Yet our little light or spark can be strengthened by the energy of our mind and when we unite with others for a purpose, we can accomplish a great deal. Go in peace and harmony, and tomorrow be ready to start forward again with old or new goals clear in mind and a will to make them come to pass!