Pippa White
Is the end of Christmas on the 5th also known as Epiphany’s Eve or the 6th on the Feast of Epiphany? Or is it some Falstaffian joke to muddle the dates?
Or is it even, as some are now asserting, Candlemas on February 2nd? Which indeed is the anniversary of the premiere of Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night”, a play that barely refers to the season at all!
This year I announced that we would pack away the decorations on January 4th (what a killjoy) as I wanted to steal a march on a sober New Year, though I fear with the COVIDNESS rumbling on, the dreadful rainy weather, the desert of good news, the sober bit might not happen…teetotally, yet.
It was a strange first Christmas without our Ellie and no other company due to continuing to isolate, our only expeditions being to the supermarket and (very) short walks. Somehow walking without a dog is soulless however hard I try to revel in the first signs of Spring.
There is little cheer in the garden save the Hellebores which as usual grace our winter with their brave and enduring beauty. Our first Christmas Rose was out on December 18th and we have newcomers emerging daily to brighten our day. The snowdrops are finally beginning to emerge as are the narcissi.
The house is now bare of twinkling lights and decorations, and I could not help wondering as I packed them up, where will we be next year? Will we still be in the grip of fear of Covid, Flu, Colds, people? Mask wearing, compliant in the face of totalitarianism? Or will Spring bring new hope and courage to be “normal” again, whatever normal is?
T.S. Eliot wrote of the Magi:
“A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.”
The very dead of winter, but he also wrote of April being “the cruellest month, bringing lilacs out of the dead land” (The Four Quartets. I think January is offering so little in the way of consolation with its dark mornings and guilty sobriety or not as the decision, this year may be. Though the days do become longer and 4 o’clock is not so gloomy, the sun does seem stronger, we still yearn for spring, and Chaucer’s prologue to The Canterbury Tales is far kinder to the month of April:
Then April the sweet showers fall
And pierce the drought of March to the root, and all
The veins are bathed in liquor of such power
As brings about the engendering of the flower….
January is wearying, Epiphany seems so definite, so final, that I turned today to the newspapers to find out when other people were taking down their Christmas decorations. I was surprised and delighted to sense a minor rebellion amongst the commenters, many saying that the tree and lights stay up until Candlemas, which was traditionally the end of the Christmas season on you guessed it February 1st or 2nd, which is also Imbolc, the pagan or Celtic festival where outdoor fires are lit and traditionally signifies the first day of spring. The other revolution was that there are calls for a “Damp January” (which I think we already have meterogically speaking) which is a minor rebuttal of Dry January, in which moderation: a glass or wine or two, or only drinking 3 days a week, is the goal, rather than the bottle(s) consumed daily over Christmas, precipitated by the Champagne breakfast on Christmas Day. (Didn’t happen here – promise.)
We can compromise, inside is bare and clear for the New Year with fresh white lilies, but outside we have not only the lights on the tree, but a new, quite common, sweet little solar fountain which is struggling valiantly given the lack of solar power to light up our evenings and is providing me with much childish delight when it actually works!
So, Christmas celebrations may be over, and the real end of the season may be a matter for debate, but the spirit of celebration of small delights such as hellebores and outdoor lights, and the essential oils of Frankincense, Myrrh and Saffron (probably the gold of the Magi as they are all healing oils) can lighten our spirits through the gloom of January. And that is my Epiphanic moment of the New Year to try and celebrate the little treasures we can find in everyday life and next year I shall leave the lights in the house up until Imbolc.
And now I am going to make a saffron infused stock to scent the house and lift the spirits. Did you know that weight for weight Saffron is the most expensive spice in the world? So, to the final compromise, as I have now determined that Imbolc is the first day of Spring and possibly the end of Christmas, I have decided to have a “Damp January” with lots of healthy food, good soups and start the Spring restart on February 1st…(com)promise!
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