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Growing up in Northern California, a lot of the "traditional imagery" of the holiday season seemed very arbitrary to me as a child. Why evergreens? Sure, they had an interesting smell, and sure, they were satisfyingly bushy, but why didn't we chop down something really interesting, like a maple or a sycamore? They had leaves, too, and raking the carpet would probably be easier than running the vacuum six times a day until the end of December. What was the big deal about snowflakes and frost? The only frost I saw came in cans of spray-on plastic foam, and having a snowball fight involved the ice maker, Stacy's snowcone machine, and a lot of very cold fingers. It seemed like an awful lot of work for something that left you with freezing hands, wet sweaters, and pissed-off parents. The plight of Frosty the Snowman was always very real and very tragic to me, since even in the coldest California winters, he'd melt into a shapeless blob in less than a week.
The media didn't help. All the holiday movies and specials aimed at kids showed a winter wonderland like the ones in the carols, all puffy snowflakes and happy cartoon reindeer. California's grey Decembers didn't look anything like that. They got snow, we got pelting rain. They got skeleton trees clawing at the perfect holiday moon, we got wet, withered leaves dropping on our heads on the way to school. They got snow days, we got cancelled recesses spent sitting in the cafeteria and staring morosely at the mud puddles that we weren't allowed to go play in. I sort of hated the kids who got to live in TV Land, because wow, were they having more fun than we were. Not even the traditional holiday "treats" made sense. What was a chestnut, exactly, other than a color for horses? Were all those people roasting horses over an open fire? Because, if so, no thank you. What was a fruitcake, and was it really the culinary equivalent of the brick? If so, why didn't the witches use that as the foundations for their houses, rather than gingerbread, which breaks really easily? I was a very literal-minded child in some ways, and holiday specials just left me confused.
The story of Persephone and Hades, on the other hand, made perfect sense. Winter in California is sort of like a switch being flipped. One day it's warm and sunny and you're wearing cute little skirts to school, the next day it's freezing cold and the puddles are all iced over and the sun goes down before you're finished with your homework. Obviously this was because Persephone had packed her suitcases and gone home for the winter, causing her mother to take away all the warm weather in a fit of pique. The idea that she'd only had time to eat six pomegranate seeds also made perfect sense, because eating a pomegranate with nothing but your fingernails is hard. After experimenting with several pomegranates from a neighbor's tree, I decided that Demeter was sort of dumb if she thought Persephone didn't want to stay in the Underworld. Nobody goes "hmmm, I'm hungry, I think I'm going to eat a fruit that comes with a padlock." Hungry people eat dates, apples, grapes, and other easy-access fruits. Determined people eat pomegranates.
By the time I was nine, I had put together what I considered a very compelling argument for Santa Claus being the son of Persephone and Hades, and Santa's Workshop actually being one of the more pleasant stopping-points on the road to the Elysian Fields. He wore pomegranate-colored robes; he had a ceremonial chariot; he lived where it was cold and dark all the time; he loved children, but didn't seek the company of adults. If there was a better job for the son of the King of the Dead and the Goddess of Fertility, I couldn't think of it!
Oddly, my third grade teacher did not agree.
I've remained a little bit outside the "normal" holiday iconography as I've grown older; I still live in California, and don't really see snow except when I leave my state to get frostbite and remember why I hate weather. I don't have a Christmas tree (I have cats instead). My last batch of holiday cookies included bats, tombstones, coffins, and happy pumpkins in a variety of shades of orange. I have never hung external lights, as I figure the aliens won't need help finding my house when the invasion begins. I enjoy getting and giving gifts, but don't necessarily remember that I need to have it done by a certain date. I like having an excuse to cook multiple turkeys in a short period of time (I love cooking turkeys). But the parts of the holiday spirit that people make the biggest deal about--happiness and joy and being nice to people--are all things that seem like they should be a big deal about all year long.
Still, I have my rituals. This holiday season, I will be heading up to Seattle to enjoy someone else's snow and the company of some of my favorite people in the world. I will re-read Terry Pratchett's Hogfather and Stephen King's IT. And I'll leave out dark chocolate pomegranate cookies for Santa, just in case his folks get hungry, too.
