Paganism and the Christmas Spirit

Ritual Sacrifice at Christmas

Christmas has always struck me as strange mish-mash of belief. We exchange gifts because of the myth of Saint Nicholas, who later morphed into Santa Claus, in a belief that seems almost pagan. We eat turkey as a carryover from Thanksgiving, odd, since we don't celebrate that here. We go to church to give quiet thanks for the fact that Christ was born, and, implicitly, the fact that God gave his only Son to us to save us from ourselves. It's pagan and religious and crass commercialism all in one.

My family reflects this spectacularly well. We go to church, we buy presents, and best of all (to me, anyway) we indulge in ritual paganism which provides all our dinner entertainment while we eat turkey.

This is known as the Ritual Sacrifice of the Beaus, an unusual holiday tradition which is adhered to in my family and is doubtless practiced in other parts of world, although, I believe, not quite as gleefully or as enthusiastically.

It's traditional at this time of year for the cousins to bring their other halves, new or otherwise, to be roundly humiliated, interrogated and generally brutalized by my decidedly matriarchal and chaos-causing extended family. Famous questions directed at hapless suitors include, "So, are you good in bed?", directed at a very shy individual who turned the color of cranberry sauce and looked like he wanted to hide his face in the turkey, and "Did you draw that yourself? Is it marker-pen?" to a pseudo-tough guy beau who was very proud of the bleeding rose tattoo which adorned his wrist. After stiffly telling the various aunts who were peering at him that, no, it was an actual tattoo, they said, totally unfazed, “Really? Why is your rose crying?"

My family has no respect for 80's rock motifs.

Buying Christmas presents though, are a bloody nightmare. Due to the fact that the fabulous Maldives trip ended so close to Christmas, Slinky's been going crazy trying to figure out the perfect presents for everyone.

Yesterday, with vociferous complaining and general grumpiness, I very grudgingly dragged myself into the fourth level of Hell, also known as Orchard, to try and buy everything I needed in a one-day spree. Fortified by cigarettes, the presence of The Boy and several intravenous infusions of ice-cream (including one massive Coke float which The Boy astutely surprised me with when he sensed pending disaster), I managed to survive, although some weren't quite so lucky. I nearly throttled a poor Border's employee when he told me, after much fruitless searching, that no, they had sold out of the items I was looking for several weeks earlier.

"Sold out?" I hissed, causing him to take a step back and look nervously for the tranquilizer gun. "What do you mean, sold out?"

"Er, we're out of stock. I'm sorry!" he said quickly, seeing me narrow my eyes. "We're not getting any more stock as far as I know, although some might be coming in a few days!" he gabbled in a frantic attempt to avoid evisceration.

"Fuck!" I snarled, practically spitting the word. I think that last was too much for him to take, and he scuttled for cover, cowering behind the cashier's desk and only popping his head out after I had stalked away. Poor thing.
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My name is Slinky and I'm a D***** addict

A brief word on dogs.

Recently, I've been suffering from my latest Internet obsession.

I, Slinky, have become a Dogster addict (btw, pw, if you're reading this, my Dogster addiction is entirely your fault).

I can't seem to get by a single day without ogling other people's dogs. I even inflict this on innocent friends, by dropping random links into my conversations. The long-suffering Boy has to put up with repeated exclamations of "Oh babe, he's so cute, isn't he cute?", insistent demands that he look at what I'm looking at, thus dragging away from his beloved cable TV to witness my latest find, and occasionally, the sudden armful of wailing Slinky who has been cruelly ambushed by one of those 'we know there is no pain for you now/ we had to let you go, we miss you’ biographies. (That's Slinky. Just a no-credit-limit bank account and a heart made of marshmallow when it comes to dogs) The Boy manfully puts up with this canine obsession with the same indulgence that he does most of my mad behavior, but I think after the twenty-fourth hundreth German Shepard, I thought I detected a slightly weary note in his voice as he agreed that this dog, too, was the cutest dog on the planet.

Thanks to a combination of sudden influx of adorables, and all the times I've ever wished I could give Zeph everything I couldn't before, I've been harboring a fantasy close to my heart, in the slim hope that one day it'll (at least in part) come true. My Christmas wish for this year is that one day, I'll get have a really big ranch in the country with snow and woods. Big enough for three German Shepards (and Zeph!), one Alaskan Malamute, one Doberman and one pug. I know they look a little like someone dropped a dog on its face after putting it in a trash compactor, but after working at the clinic, I realized how attractive a breed these dogs are. The fact that they do the best 'sad face' ever doesn't hurt. Come on. How can you resist this?

Anyone who'll give me that, and you'll have a Slinky for life.

The Slinky Cat is not a people cat, but dogs rock her world.