Amid the Flurry

It’s getting to be that time, folks.

Truth be told, I think it’s a bit far past that time, but the year has stacked things oddly against our best efforts… as time and fortune often do.

Still we are coming up on time for the Ancestral Winter Feast. Which we have stricken to fall next Saturday, Primal Heart and I… much too soon and yet, still there is time. At least I will continue to tell myself there is.

This is a tradition which we have heartily embraced and created around the premise of one of the holy days celebrated by the illustrious Ms. Dirty. Who will never cease to amaze and impress me with her dedication and general awesomeness.

What we do is, in fact, maybe a little different from what others may… and it’s a practice which I hold as immensely beautiful and sacred.

The feast itself is intended as an honoring of the dead… a feast for those fallen. For our beloved and for the wandering hungry.

As laid out it is a time to research and prepare dishes which may hold ancestral importance. Traditional items. Items which have cultural relevance, as well as family favorites.

I’m feeling a little overwhelmed, and more than a little unprepared. But still it’s important to carry on… No matter how I feel I have missed the mark or failed in my plans. Because in the end it’s not about me. It’s not about the living, not really. It’s about coming together to celebrate our history, the shared and the disparate. It’s time to feed those whose bodies are no longer. To feed the wandering and the unnamed, as well as the well-loved and tended.

Because that’s what winter time is for, in many ways… it’s a time of hunger and lack, the earth is dormant and the skies grow chill and unforgiving… and so we feed back into the world and beyond the world. We give of ourselves and our bounty, and we insure the well-being of our kin and our souls.

For Primal Heart and I, it’s also a time to feed the living.

We chose last year, to take this spectacularly beautiful event and bring it to our community. To offer the time and place for our nearest to share of their ancestral history and to feed their own beloved fallen at the same table. We feed the living as well as the dead.

It may only be the second year we’ve participated in this tradition, but I intend to keep it going far longer… to bring together our loved ones, to gather by table and candle… loading plates full, and setting altars tall with food and drink. Opening the doors beyond those of wood and frame for those spirits who hunger to join us in feast. To feel once more the warmth of food shaped by heart and intent and honor… to roll in the laughter and commemoration of a witches with their eyes pointed in all directions. All times.

I’m still working on the more realistic list for this feast, and many things await my attention… but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I am so looking forward to celebrating another year feeding my beloveds.

About these ads