We took part in the annual 'Burning Away the Winter Blues' festival on Saturday, and man, all that pagan ritualism really gets the blood flowing! (metaphorically, not physically).
We gathered torches, flags, pennants and drums. We marched from the Paddlewheeler to Robert Service, sharing three well fortified thermoses of mulled wine, thanks to dear friend's apt foresight! It was actually quite chilly, even though this winter has been remarkably mild. My legs froze until we got to the fire.
The turnout was great, as usual! The effigy was this bizarre face with reaching hands, and it was quite spooky looking. I think I liked last year's effigy of the dragon a bit better, this one reminded me of fall strawmen set on fire in some witch-burning town festival.
The fire was crazy hot, I loved it until I swore I smelled something burning, like my jacket... And the next day my face felt kind of funny, like I burned it? We celebrated by writing down our 'blues' and putting them in Arlin's paper bag to burn. My blues felt rather mundane, and I'll be extra-daring and share a few:
Secret nemesii
Distance apart
Parental problems
Allergies
Bad marks on my master's papers
So, all in all, I hope those things get resolved or at least I can stop thinking about them!
Showing posts with label Burning away the winter blues. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Burning away the winter blues. Show all posts
Monday, March 22, 2010
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Going back to our Pagan roots
Right about now, with the last icy fingers of winter wrapped around our throats, people don't feel like burning effigies, they feel like burning everything down to the ground.
Enter a great new way to de-stress: Burning shit!!
The burning away the winter blues festival was planned at exactly the right time- March 21, 2009. Well, I think it could happen every week and we'd still feel totally psycho.
You can bring bits of rage scrawled onto paper, cigarette containers, paper-mache bosses...and watch them light up with red fury. Paper products only, please, think of the environment. I am very much looking forwards to it. I love the symbolic (yet harmless!) idea of burning your enemies as an effigy...
It reminds me of an effigy-burning I witnessed at a huge festival in Spain, but that was a happy time, when everyone raced into the ink-black sea to welcome the good times. This one is very different.
Ideally it is a happy festival, but I have a feeling it is mostly so people don't go around destroying property or burning houses or places of work down. A happy compromise, we'll call it. Let's watch our fears, anger, worries, concern and hatred flame into the sky and then dissipate into a gentle ash, coating us.
If only life was that easy!
Festival created by Whitehorse local Arlin MacFarlane.
Bow down to the Pagan gods of FIRE.
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