The Amazing Upside-Down Backwards Book!

   A couple of days before Christmas, I was in the Indigo store in north London, looking for a book/gift for Doralyn.

   I had nothing particular in mind and was simply looking at book covers for anything which sounded interesting and possibly something she might like.

   I found myself staring down at the cover of a book called "The End of Men--And the Rise of Women", by Hanna Rosin. This sounded intriguing, so I picked the first copy off the shelf and opened it up.

   Everything on the inside was upside down!

   My first thought was well, this is what they mean by the end of men--men won't be able to read this. Out of curiosity, though, I picked up a few more copies and they were all conventional. I realized, then, that I had something different on my hands.

   At this point, I thought I would simply turn it upside down and read it that way.

   When I did this though, I discovered that not only was it upside down, it was backwards!

   What you needed to do was go to the "back" of the book and read it in the opposite direction. Essentially, what had happened was that the wrong side of the pages got bound together

   Okay, this disoriented and really screwed me up for a little while til I was able to wrap my head around the process, which basically didn't happen til much later.

   It also greatly excited me! I actually ended up buying two copies of the book (you're welcome, Hannah!) so I could take them home for comparison. I also couldn't help but show it off to the total strangers around me in Indigo. The salesclerk actually offered to sell it to me cheaper but I was too excited for that, and paid full price.

   I wrapped both books as a gift for Doralyn and we spent a lot of time showing it off to the Christmas company for the next few days. At this point, nether of us has had much of an opportunity to sit down and read anything, let alone an upside-down-backwards book, but the couple of pages I have managed to look at seem quite interesting.

   Just need to decide whether I'm going to read it frontwards or backwards!
        

My Easter

   This past Sunday was Easter, and I spent it in a very leisurely way-- slept in, sat on my butt on the couch with the laptop, made a a quick trip out for propane and then had a nice steak dinner with my wife and her mother.

Not terribly fond of either one of them, actually...

   I did all this under the auspices of a holiday commemorating the resurrection of Jesus Christ-- an impossible event involving a possibly mythical man. I am game, though, for any celebration which provides me with an extra-long weekend. Yay!
   Back when I was a young lad, Easter invariably meant a  sunny day, lilies and a trip to church. Thankfully, it also meant candy and eggs. I remember it kind of annoyed me that Easter didn't generate the deluge of gifts that Christmas did and it befuddled me that people said it was a religiously more significant occurrence. I guess it was the fact that anybody can be born but only Jesus could actually die and then come back again which highlighted its significance. Oh well, as a kid, it just seemed like both a wasted opportunity for more gifts and having to get dressed up, all over again.
   I want to say that I am an atheist. It's a term which I think most people are familiar with. It's also a really nice, short little word and I appreciate short, little words. Most people understand an atheist to be someone who does not believe in God, or other deities.
   

Love it when the grandparents get all cute like that!

The problem though is that, by the truest definition of atheism, an atheist also does not believe in an afterlife. I believe in an afterlife. I just don't believe in God, or gods and I don't think someone is "in charge". Why and how I believe in a godless afterlife is probably a subject for a future blog post, however. In the meantime, I'm not sure what you should call me.
   Because of all this, religious holidays like Christmas and Easter can be a little problematic. There is some need to partake of holiday rituals because the majority of your friends and loved ones are. At the same time, though, there is also a need to protect your integrity as a non-believer.
   I wonder if Easter would be more fun if I believed in Jesus? There was a time when I at least believed in the existence of Jesus and I spent a lot of time pondering on what kind of man he might have been. I never believed he was the son of a god or anything but I did believe that he walked this earth and possibly had some charismatic pull over people.

Jeffrey Hunter in "King of Kings". Some actors get crucified
for their performances---Hunter didn't.

   Because I used to think he actually existed, it was always enjoyable for me to sit down and watch movies about his life, particularly at Easter. One of my all-time favourite movies is "King of Kings", with Jeffrey Hunter. For a brief period of time, on Easter day, I would take out my copy of this movie and watch it, generally by myself. It was kind of my own little Easter tradition. It's one of those powerfully epic Biblical movies and certain scenes never ceased to move me. I was also in love with the soundtrack.
   As my belief that there actually was a Jesus of Nazareth dwindled, my love for depictions of his life necessarily changed as well. Suddenly, it made almost as much sense to believe in a movie which had Santa Claus in it. So I now feel robbed of the one small connection I still had left with Easter---its movies.
   I am still quite happy to wish my friends and loved ones a Happy Easter, the same as I might wish them a Merry Christmas or a Happy Hanukkah (or St. Patrick's Day or Halloween, for that matter). I have no problem with acknowledging what might be important to other people, regardless of what my own belief system might be. I think we all grasp at what makes us happy and if the thought of sailing along on this rudder-less ship called Life, headed inexorably toward the edge of one of the greatest experiences a person can have makes me happy than so be it! Perhaps I should come up with my own little holiday, a day in which I celebrate a lack of gods in the world...hmmm...how about "Just Do Good Because It's Good Day"? Or maybe "Big Unknown Adventure Day"? Or, if all else fails, we could call it "Don't Put All Your Eggs In One Easter Basket Day"!     
   
    

Happy Whatever Days!

   Here and there on Facebook these days, I've come across a variety of posts wherein opinions have been offered as to whether we should be saying "Merry Christmas" to one another during this festive season or perhaps should be using the more politically correct "Happy Holidays". I've also run across people decrying the use of "X" in "Xmas". Then there is "Jesus Is The Reason For The Season" and "Let's Put Christ Back In Christmas".

   I get the point people are trying to make. There is a pretty general feeling that we've gotten away from the "true meaning" of Christmas and have simply given in to the commerce of the season. As North America becomes even more of an ethnic cultural melting pot there will be more and more pressure to homogenize the Christmas season so as not to offend sensibilities along the way. This is difficult for many of us to accept. Not only has Christmas lost much of the significance it had for us as kids, we are now being told it's not acceptable to share our Christmas spirit with people using traditional greetings anymore!
   Honestly, I refuse to get angry about this. If I feel like wishing someone a Merry Christmas, I will simply do that. If I happen to know that the particular person is of a different faith and celebrates the season under a different name I will try and use that greeting, if I know what it is. If I don't know what it is, I might revert to something a little more generic.

   Christmas already has a pretty tenuous grip on my happiness, as it is. As a kid, naturally enough, I was always excited about it. As an adult, though, there are way too many stressors to be dealt with. Family get-togethers are almost impossible to co-ordinate, multiple work parties need to be scheduled around, perfect gifts need buying, and any pre-existing tensions are only heightened at this time of year. The list goes on, I don't think I need to itemize them totally.
   Every year I tell myself that whatever it is about Christmas that bothers me the most I won't fall prey to it again this year. Then, before I know it, I find myself just as engaged in the whole Christmas merry-go-round as I have been all the other years.
   It's not that I object to celebrating Christmas. What I would like to be able to do, however, are all the things I'm not feeling like I'm being forced to do. Whatever they are.
   Okay, I've gotten away a little bit from the whole "Merry Christmas" versus "Happy Holidays" thing I originally wanted to write about.
   When I really think about it, me wishing someone a "Merry Christmas" isn't as much a supposition that they will be celebrating the same kind of Christmas I will be as it is a wish that they will simply enjoy the same kind of feelings I hope to enjoy during this particular time of year, no matter what kind of religion they observe.
   In this way, were a Jewish person to wish me a Happy Hanukkah, I would still get their meaning or intent. And still be as thankful for the sentiment.

Poem 2

   A poem that seems appropriate at this time of year, and as another one of our soldiers' bodies has been repatriated.


December twenty-sixth
(this game with my conscience)


When they simulate
the blood as well,
provide snap-top
plastic coffins
with miniature flags
to drape over them,
hands that separate from arms
and men from sons
then my conscience will win out,
knowing there have been
no niceties here, that
at least one time we
have dealt again with
useless, ugly
endings.

Until this happens, though,
I am the factory
of plastic armament,
have contracted with my son
to put together
war toys.

Thoughts on the Season

   If nothing else, Christmas is one of those times of the year when some reflection is done. In your mind perhaps your year is summarized, perhaps you are even one of those people who sends out letters to your friends and relatives describing the events of the past twelve months and all of what you thought were its significant moments or achievements. It is also a time for looking ahead, perhaps you work on your New Years resolutions, make plans for improvements in your life.
   I do tend to engage in some of all this, although there is no real reason why it should not be an ongoing process throughout  the other months of the year. What I do know and what is common knowledge to most everyone else is that your stress levels get ratcheted up enormously at this time of year. I invariably find myself wondering just why this occurs but, more importantly, why I  let it. I swear it'll be different next year, so help me!

   A couple of blogs ago, I talked about reading "The Pagan Christ" this past year and mentioned the theory that its author, Tom Harpur, subscribed to; that there may not have been an historical Jesus. Well, I do find this quite credible and it does shed a different kind of light on this particular season. Jesus may not be the "reason for the season" because there may not have been a Jesus!
   So, for a variety of reasons and including the afore-mentioned brand new one, I find myself pondering the meaning of Christmas once again. Giving is never a bad thing, wanting to be with family is never a bad thing and pondering the positive changes you'd like to see in your life is never a bad thing, either. But why save all this for December, I wonder? If the need out there is a real need, then why aren't the Salvation Army kettles operating year-round? I'd be just as happy to toss in a couple of bucks in June as at Christmas time! I'm also pretty sure low-income kids need gifts throughout other months of the year, each one of them has a birthday, I'm guessing! The mind-boggling part of it is that we make ourselves maybe $500 (just a random number I picked, believe me!) poorer so that we can make our friends and neighbours $500 richer, in terms of merchandise. Of course we become $500 richer because our friends and relatives are getting $500 poorer buying for us. A vicious circle, for sure. The end result, worldwide, is that billions and billions of dollars go sideways, for Christ's sake! Yep, we don't need to spend what we spend and we don't need to get what we get. To quote a line from "Jesus Christ Superstar", "think of the things you could do with that money!"
   At some point in my life that I can't really pinpoint, whether or not Christmas was a "success" for me depended on whether or not someone was surprised or delighted with a particular gift I might have gotten them. I did not base my happiness on the pile of goodies at my feet Christmas morning. There has been the odd Christmas morning I dreaded, simply because I was not excited about anything I'd bought for anyone. They were hard to get through. More often than not, though, I have been almost as excited at the prospects of my loved ones opening their gifts as I could remember being as a child in anticipation of what was to come for myself. It is one of the small things I appreciate about myself as an adult and I imagine that many others feel the same way. Kind of a shame, though, that this happens on such a limited basis, calendar-wise.

   So, I guess I do want to wish people a "Merry Christmas", whatever it is and why. May we all  let the stress float away and may we all have Scrooge-like redemptions! May we all self-reflect and like what we see!

The Pagan Christmas

   I occasionally envy the dead. As much as I enjoy life and living, I envy them for the knowledge they have that I don't. I have always been curious as the nature of the afterlife, if there is one, but unfortunately there is only one way to discover this. I believe that all the great mysteries of life will somehow be revealed at this time and I'm dying to find out. Just not fast enough.
   Earlier on this year, I read a book called "The Pagan Christ". It was written by Tom Harpur, an extremely well-known and highly regarded theologian and spiritualist. He is a Rhodes Scholar, T.V. personality (Harpur's Heaven and Hell) and his bio is rather academically astounding. The book is an extremely ground-breaking one as it flies in the face of what is generally regarded as the accepted story of Jesus Christ ie. the virgin birth, the performance of miracles and the final execution. In examining many other religions, he discovered that this story is repeated (different names and faces maybe) in many other religions, most of which pre-date Christianity!  He makes particular reference to the Egyptians, who incorporated this story into their religion at least a thousand years prior to the birth of Christ. Harpur spends much time delving into the similarities between all these religions and refers to the "Christos Myth", the general term for this narrative (birth, teachings, death of a central deity) which permeates these other major religions.
   It is a fascinating read, albeit a very heavy one with much information and cross-referencing to digest. But it is well worth the time. Possibly the most astounding thing to come out of the book is Harpur's belief that there may not even have been a historical Jesus of Nazareth! He bases this on a number of things but one of the most telling is his assertion that there are no non-Christian accounts of Jesus ever having existed. During a time period when they were keeping pretty accurate historical records there is no mention made of Jesus other than by people who came to call themselves Christians after his purported death. Apparently the Romans made no mention of him as a living person, nor is he mentioned in other historical chronicles at the time. Pretty absorbing stuff to read.
   What is fascinating through all of this, though, is that Harpur, once he was able to wrap his head around these ideas in an objective way, actually believes that his spirituality has been very fundamentally strengthened. Because his "Christos Myth" is not so intrinsically tied to one central character during one very brief period of time it is much easier to see it in a more universal light. The commonality of the myth suggests to him that there may be a sounder basis for belief than even the Bible can offer.
   I find myself thinking about this quite a bit as Christmas draws nearer. I had always believed in Jesus as an historical person and the stories about him as reasonably accurate, up to his death. Whether he was the "Son of God" I don't know, but suspected he wasn't. I have my own theory on the existence of a god but I will save that for another blog. I do know that many learned people believe that Jesus of Nazareth was born much earlier in the calendar year and that at some point the celebration of his birth got moved to coincide with some kind of pagan festival (winter solstice?) I do not doubt this, either. It does have a revisionist ring to it as does "The Pagan Christ". I do believe that I will find out the answer someday. And if it's later than sooner, that's fine too.