Columbus Day, again

To be perfectly honest, I find a holiday like Columbus Day shameful.

Oh, I have nothing against holidays. In fact, if it were up to me, there would be at least one holiday per month, without exception, and I would have no qualms about finding rather innocuous reasons for having them. In March, we should all be able to celebrate the Vernal Equinox, if nothing else. In August, we should simply have a Holiday of Holidays, if nothing else. Yes, every month deserves to have a holiday, and not one of those wimpy floating ones, but a real Monday holiday as it should be.

Of course, if we're going to take this approach, I would insist that each month have a holiday that is meaningful and mostly -- and I emphasize, mostly -- inoffensive to the population. You see, we could declare, say, St. Patrick's Day as a national holiday, but that would be partial to the Irish. We could have a religious holiday in August, but this would be disrespecting of non-Christians. I'm sure, though, that it wouldn't take long to find a Monday that was acceptable to everyone. After all, we only need to have a will to have a way.

Columbus Day, in all due respect, is not one of thoses days. Yes, I know that his intentions were honorable, that he merely wanted to find an alternative to the status quo of his day, but the way he went about it and the results of his personal policies made live more than difficult for millions of people, and we're talking about millions of people who never had and no longer have a voice in their own demise.

Yes, Columbus Day honors the overtaking of different cultures for no other reason than one believed that one's own culture was the best the world had to offer combined with the arrogance of believing that white, Western Europeans were in a better position to decide what was good for the world than any other peoples are the face of the earth.

In the meantime, we've come to realize that Columbus really didn't get it right, that he didn't understand the world with which he was confronted, and that he represented a way of thinking that derided and suppressed any way of understanding the world that didn't conform to their own.

No,I don't believe there were any evil intentions. No, I believe that Columbus and his crew's intentions were good. But, at the same time, I believe that they simply failed to recognize that those who were already here deserved to be treated with the same respect as any other human being on the planet.

Unfortunately, we didn't get it then, and it's quite obvious we don't get it even now. We may never learn, even if I hope that I'm wrong.

Happy Holidays & Merry Christmas

One of the silliest notions out and about these days is that there's a War on Christmas. It takes a pretty simple mind to think that just because one group of people celebrates one way and other groups celebrate other ways, their way is the best or only acceptable way. This is the kind of thing that turns me off from religion: when it becomes so exclusive and chauvinistic that any other form of belief is not just intolerable, it is downright wrong. And this insistence that I am right and you are wrong is the guarantee for many other people not wanting to celebrate at all.

The month of December (as we call it today) and the time of the winter solstice (which has been recognized by people for practically as long as there have been people) were taken as times for celebration. The ancient Romans celebrated the Saturnalia, the Mayas and Incas had their festivals at this time. At the solstice, the Scandinavians celebrated Juul and the custom was taken over by the English (as in Yule Log), in Poland some still celebrate Gody, in Northwest Pakistan there is Chaomos, and even today the Buddhists celebrate Bodhi Day on the 8th, and Hanukkah was from the 7th to the 14th this year. So belated Happy Bodhi Day to my Buddhist friends and Happy Hanukkah to my Jewish ones.

For those who think that political correctness has taken over, it is only because you have allowed it to. You're not going to go to jail for saying Merry Christmas, and people who are so thin-skinned and easily offended not only need to get over themselves, they need to recognize that any holiday greeting, even the wrong one, is simply intended as a friendly, human gesture. If you think it's any more than that ... if you take it as any less than that ... you've got more problems than most of us can help you with.

Unfortunately, I could not see that the Hindus and Sikhs have a holiday around this time, nor does Islam this (or next year). But, as everyone else has a reason to celebrate and things are going to be closed down on this day or the other, take the time to enjoy it with friends and family, and if you have no one to celebrate, feel free to celebrate with me, at least in spirit, because we probably won't be able to get together.

When there is so much going on in so many different quarters and for so many different reasons, there is nothing wrong with a quick "Happy Holidays" to be inclusive (as long as it's well-intended and heartfelt). It is a busy time of year, as we all know.

What all of these celebrations have in common, however, is that they give special attention to light (of hope, of good faith in the future, and well-being), warmth (at least in the Northern Hemisphere where it is coldest), peace and good-will to others. All of them share this. All of them. To think of "war" at all at this time of year is bizarre, narrow-minded, intolerant, and, well, ignorant. I don't have to share another's belief (or non-belief, for that matter), but the most decent, human thing to do, at minimum, is respect it.

So, Happy Holidays to all, no matter what you're celebrating. And if you have no real reason to celebrate, borrow someone else's or even make up your own, but make it a celebration of peace, joy, and hope. We'll all be the better for it.

Going green

Most of you are probably thinking I'm going to go off on one of my ecological tangents, ranting on about how we're raping, pillaging, and plundering the environment, how our obsession -- no, addiction -- to fossil fuels is going to be our undoing as a species, how climate change (regardless of what the non-science whackos might think) is turning all of us into dinosaurs, and how heating the oceans, filling them with garbage and poisoning our freshwater aquifers is less than intelligent, but I'm not. Why would I want to do a thing like that? That's something for every day of the week, but not today. Today's a non-holiday! It's time again to celebrate for absolutely no reason at all.

Yes, today's St. Patrick's Day and all across America, and increasingly throughout the world, people are taking the day to put on something green (well, except for some pretty broomstick-up-the-butt types in Northern Ireland ... but, hey, there are party-poopers everywhere ... and how can you poop with a broomstick up your butt? ... uh, another story), put on their buttons that say "Kiss me, I'm Irish" when they've never likely seen, let alone even, owned as much as an Irish setter, and Boston will turn the Charles River green (with something other than chemical sludge, though maybe not as healthy) and Chicagoans will drink green (literally) beer (whereby elsewhere in the civilized world "green beer" is simply unaged beer, but that's another story too).

What's the big deal? Given the recent fascination with Catholic scandals and the Pope resigning, I can't begin to imagine it's some deep and secret desire to revere the fellow who is Ireland's patron saint because he drove all the snakes off the Ireland. I'm sure if you ask a true Irishman or Irishwoman, for that matter, they'll tell you there have been snakes on the island all along, but none of them were native Irish anymore. Or, is it that we're guilty about what we're doing to the environment? No, no, don't get anxious ... I'm not sneaking off on a tangent, I'm only asking the question. I'd find that a difficult one to believe anyway. Why is it then that hard-working, Puritan descendants (to a great extent, either physically or culturally) would want to celebrate the arrival of Christianity in Ireland? Don't get me wrong, folks, anyone and everyone who celebrates for precisely these reasons has my full and total support. I'm wondering more about all the merry makers. The loud ones.

On the one hand, it is the one day during Lent when the ban on sacrifice is lifted. Whatever you might have given up for Lent, whatever fasting you may be doing, you don't have to do today. What is more, the Irish are known world wide as a light-hearted people. If you don't believe me, leave America, travel anywhere in the world and find your way to an Irish pub (there's no major city on the planet without one) and you'll find a warm, welcoming, friendly atmosphere, where you're expected more than allowed to laugh, and where it's fair game to make fun (or take the mickey out) of just about anything or anyone you please.

No, if you ask me, St. Patrick's Day is to spring, what Halloween is to fall: one of those "holidays" we have no real idea about, other than someone at sometime somewhere celebrated it, and since they both occur in the middle of a dry stretch, are all the more reason to get simply loosen up a bit. OK, I think I get it. Cheers!