Don’t you dare tell him I said so, unless you’re convinced this kind of affirmation would attribute to his upbringing in any way that does not complicate our future relationship and even then I would still hold you accountable for blowing the whistle, but sometimes baby knows best and on this winter solstice, the day that marks the symbolic death and rebirth of the Sun, also known as Midwinter if you’re an optimist or just its beginning if you prefer climatic accuracy, his lazy attempt at hibernation seems the only sensible objective for it, without even one look outside but harshly warned off by the certified pouring rain and accompanying winds howling, so to say I was daintily discouraged to begin with is an understatement, admonished by accomplishments that may be expected of me today, like solving the shower blockage and fixing the leaking roof.
These are the kind of targets that, with high probability, would nip any spontaneous pagan ritual in the bud we would otherwise no doubt have engaged ourselves in today, so too bad the attractiveness of that bottle of this year’s sloe gin that has been waiting months for its first quality test in us celebratory tasting it, forget the walnut wine and the hazelnut liqueur, because of priorities and how these activities affect my general mood when there is no guarantee for success, degrading all imaginative symbolism into just an ordinary gray Monday.
I guess we should count our blessings anyway for not living in a more tradition-driven country, like Japan, where it’s custom on winter solstice to soak oneself in a yuzu hot bath, in order not to catch cold in the winter, what would have seriously added to our current inconvenience.
Not to spend this shortest day entirely in darkness, an appended task I gave myself to fight the frustration and at least try to simply commemorate this special moment of the annual cycle, I brewed us some saffron tea this afternoon, appropriately yellow and radiant like the sun, contemporaneously the unfortunate absentee at Les Pierres but in fact symbolically born today, let all these bad spirits of decay be lifted by its prophesied return.
