Eliza Daley ~ Wordcraft & Musing on Home & Hope
Walpurgis Night The last day of April has been a fraught time for millennia. This is a night when pranks are pulled, when spells are cast and wishes are granted, when the Good Folk pass through the veils to walk the woodlands, and when witches dance. The Beltaine fires were lit at midnight on May… Continue reading The Daily: 30 April 2024
Floralia Cosiddetta Flora from the Villa di Arianna in Stabiae near Pompeii, 1st century Roman fresco The festival of Floralia is another very old holiday. It honors Flora, the Roman idea of fertility that is embodied in spring flowers. Flora is one of the oldest deities in the Roman pantheon. She is older than Rome,… Continue reading The Daily: 26 April 2024
A Red-Letter Day April 25th is a complicated date. It is St Mark’s Day, which is honored with a wide variety of celebrations; and it is Robigalia, an ancient Roman festival intended to propitiate the god — or demon — of wheat rust and thus ensure a good harvest. These disparate themes may actually be… Continue reading The Daily: 25 April 2024
Today is... the equinox? Vernal Equinox Quiz True or False: The vernal equinox is when spring begins. Not exactly. The beginning of spring depends on where you live, and it is more a cultural phenomenon than a meteorological one. Tradition in Ireland has spring beginning with St Brigid’s Day on 1 February. Spring weather may… Continue reading The Daily: 17 March 2024
Participatory Democracy Today is Town Meeting day in Vermont. For the uninitiated, this is the day when Vermonters pack themselves into school gyms and various meeting halls to vote on town governance for the upcoming year. Officials are elected. Laws are debated and passed. Budgets are assigned. If there are complaints or disturbances, these are… Continue reading The Daily: 5 March 2024
Lion and Lamb March is upon us once again. An Old English name for March was Hlyda, meaning “loud”, presumably referring to the roaring March winds. This name survived as Lide in the West countries. Eat leeks in Lide and ramsons in May, And all the year after physicians may play. — proverb from western… Continue reading The Daily: 1 March 2024
On Valentine's Day, I woke to several inches of snow draped over my corner of the world. This is not the feet of snow that had fallen to the south, but it was far more than we in central Vermont were told to expect. No road prep happened. No clearing of walkways. And because we've… Continue reading The Daily: 19 February 2024
February First Fruits & Quirinalia To highlight just how different the seasonal cycle is depending on latitude, mid-February, the last ides period of the ritual year in Rome, was a festival of the first-fruit offerings. While here in Vermont we are barely thinking about the growing season, never mind able to see actual earth, during… Continue reading The Daily: 16 February 2024
Like many people, I find the American version of Valentine’s Day and the saccharine and monochromatic view of love it promotes to be repulsive. In my younger days I assumed the whole farce was invented by the greeting card and gifting industry, along with the rise of all manner of fake holidays intended to get… Continue reading The Daily: 14 February 2024
If Brigid visited your house with a blessing last night, show her your gratitude by beginning your spring cleaning in her honor. If you have a woodstove, today is a good day to clean out the ashes and begin spreading them on your garden beds. (If you live where the soils are already saline, especially… Continue reading The Daily: 1 February 2024
By My Solitary Hearth 