Io Saturnalia

So, we have made it past the Winter Solstice. Shopping is done, the children who live with me all have their presents. I still need to send the presents to the children who live with my first ex-wife. I have not heard from them much. I hoped once upon a time they could enter their comments here, and perhaps we could develop a distance relationship this way. It hasn't worked out.

Early winter is commonly a time of depression. That is why we, and before us Scandanavian/English Yule,and the Roman/Saturnalia, celebrate riotous holidays in that window. A really gripping orgy would shut down the bad feedback loops which drive one to inaction and melancholy. On the other hand, religions with their start in the southern deserts had more austere holidays. Eid which supposedly bans even eating during the day, milks depression, but turns the longer nights into a party. As an austere desert religion moves north, the winter holiday becomes more raucous.

We, for all our pretensions, are still trapped in a monkey body. Though we create an image of G-d in our own likeness, our deepest desires are still that of a frightened monkey, scavenging from larger predators on the African plains. That is what we were only a million years ago. The progress we have made in the last few years is amazing. It is no wonder that conservative religious belief has trouble adapting.