I've already posted a diary on our two official Numenist Celebrations: Founders Day and Cookie Day.
Perhaps it's time to post up a diary on our unofficial but beloved Celebrations. These are as important to being a Numenist as the two official holy days are because they bring us together as a community and they give us the ability to explore our spirituality and beliefs and in portected, safe, and supportive environments.
Plus, they are awesomely fun.
I'm going to take these in no particular order. Part of it is that these Celebrations have no firm date upon which they must be Celebrated.One of the things I, personally, love so much about Numenism is that our holy days are flexible enough to shift over slightly to occur on or beside a weekend, giving us more time to Celebrate, what with being employed by non-Numenists and all.
Corny Movie Night This is actually a rather new Celebration, thanks to the advent of Betamax and VHS. Back then, it was expensive to buy both the machine and the movies in the mid-70's, so we invested in buying one device and gathering at that house to watch a movie and socialize and eat and talk about charity projects. Some of our best charity efforts are born at these Corny Movie N ights: Sandwich Saturdays, Keep Earth Beautiful Club, Edible Pennies, and more. Plus, we got to watch a movie and dissect it with critical, intelligent friends, and eat yummy food.
One other important change in Numenism occured at Corny Movie Nights - the creation of the Numenist House. We decided to sponsor a House, where we could keep supplies, equipment, and such, and meet for Corny Movie Nights, Summer Drums, Telling the Beads, Firsts, and other Celebrations, and rituals and all the essential community socializing, rather than imposing on one Celebrant for these things. We needed a permanent place to gather.
Moosemas Moosemas is perhaps one of our best beloved Celebrations. It was one of our earliest ones, first Celebrated in 1962, then frequently thereafter. It is a portable Celebration, taking place whenever we felt the need for it. Weekly, monthly, quint-annually, bi-annually...
Need determines how frequently this is Celebrated. That need is almost always a spiritual need. We need to gather with trusted people to discuss deeply important spiritual matters, but we need to do so circumspectly, not to confront it head-on.
Our first Moosemas happened during another event - we had gathered for a music concert. It rained anad we retreated to an enclosed picnic pavilion that had a fireplace at one end. I just happened to have a huge cast iron cauldron in my car that I'd picked up from my mother's house and was taking home with me. It was big enough to bathe small children in. We'd all brought foods to snack on (and some had brought food to toss at the performers - what can I say?), so we had carrots, tomatoes, potatoes, celery, sausages, roast beef, bread. A couple of us also had packets of seasonings - salt, pepper, sage, bouillon cubes. There was a cauldron and a fire and water and food. It was only natural they all come together. So we cackled and had fun making a huge-assed cauldron of stew, and because it evoked images of the Witches of McBeth, we naturally fell into talking about what we believed and scoffed at one another and paused thoughtfully at times. Mind you, we weren't the only concert-goers in the pavilion. Lots of strangers sheltered with us. They, too, got caught up in the moment, contributing oddments to the stew. Because we lacked bowls and back then we weren't as rigidly concerned about germs and health codes, we all gathered around that cauldron and dipped out of it with bread slops or cups or whatever we could find, including spoons and ladles that appeared from somewhere.
The whole pavilion full of people participated, with us Numenists kind of in charge of the cauldron. We were up the whole night, telling stories, sharing our innermost beliefs and feelings. At dawn, we parted ways with most of the people there, never to see them again. Some stayed, and that was when the Church of the Pagan Gospel (as we'd been calling Numenism at that point) became the Clan of the Cauldron and Moosemas was born.
The second Moosemas was a yearning to re-create the spontaneous energy of that night in the pavilion. We hauled out the cauldron, filled it with stew stuff, and two different people brought chocolate mousse to share. We had on PJs and slippers, and the TV was on, playing cartoons for some unfathomable reason (this was in the days before Betamax, before VHS, we watched what was broadcast on TV or we watched nothing). It wasn't the same, quite, but it felt similar, so we, being who we were, dissected it and pulled out the elements that made it work for us.
The third Moosemas, it was chocolate mousse, a stuffed moose toy, and PJs, with lots of lounging around and just rambling talk about religion and society and such - and come morning, there were Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons on the TV, which merely confirmed for us that we must call this Celebration "Moosemas", and these elements became the bedrock of the Celebration: PJs, chocolate (preferably as mousse), stuffed moose toys, and Rocky and Bullwinkle. Every Moosemas since has had them, and it's easier now that Rocky and Bullwinkle are available on DVD to have a Moosemas whenever we needed without waiting until Rocky and Bullwinkle were showing on TV.
Summer Drum - This always happens in the summer, not on any particular day, but when we all decide we need a low-effort retreat, we plan it out. We gather with easy food that needs little preparation, a few drums, set aside little areas for quietly meditating or communing with Dea Nutrix. Kite flying and frisbees are an important part of a Summer Drum, nearly as important as the drums. Drumming is nearly constant, not loud, just - pervasive. At night, we gather around a bonfire or fire pit and tell stories to the background beat of the drum and roast marshmallows and tube steaks and such.
It's a bonding, relaxing time with no drama and we leave the Drum feeling refreshed and in touch with ourselves, our place in Dea Nutrix, and one another.
Telling the Beads - This is sort of a storytelling/divination type event. Nearly everyone has a "trinket bag" filled with colored beads, tiny trinkets of things that are meaningful to us or that represent portions of our stories. Each object has a story of its own, and when we gather to tell the beads, we take turns drawing a trinket or bead from our little bags and setting it down in front of us and sharing the story of that bead or object.
This is my trinket bag:
And its contents:
Some people are strict about the beads they have and color meanings and such, because they use them for divination. I use mine for storytelling so I mix them up.
This is another flexible, floating Celebration, used to bond and build community and is accomapnied by food and thinking about Dea Nutrix and spiritual matters.
Reading the Ropes - This is sort of like the beads, but is for groups rather than individuals. We take ribbons or strips of fabric that hold a special place or served a special purpose in our historic events and braid or knot them together. On Founders Day or whenever we get a new Celebrant, we read the ropes, telling the stories of the events and history the length of fabric tells. Sure, we could write it down in books and just give the books to the new Celebrants to read (and we do that, too), but having the whole ritual with the respectful unveiling of the lengthy rope, and the older Celebrants taking turns telling the stories of each segment is more impressive and meaningful, and in stressful times, it's comforting.
Firsts - Some Firsts are truly Firsts. These include graduations, first homes, first baby steps, and other rites of passage like coming of age and such. Others are annual Firsts, like First Fire and First 'Mater Day and First Triple Digit Day. Each is Celebrated according to its needs. They, like most Celebrations, have amassed some traditions.
A young girl's Coming of Age involves all the women gathering around her to braid sections of her hair and tell their Coming of Age stories, and presenting her with gifts to help her get all the rest of the way to adulthood, and food.
A young boy's Coming of Age involves all the men gathering with him and testing his strength and accuracy as they tell the stories of their Coming of Age, and the gifts and food.
First 'Mater Day is when the tomatoes finally (!) ripen and we take that first tomato and share it carefully out among us on a slice of fresh baked bread and fresh churned butter and a delicate sprinkle of salt. If we're lucky, more than one tomato ripens by the time we all gather.
First Fire is when those who have fireplaces would light the first winter fire. We gather with tube steaks, popcorn, marshmallows, potatoes, and muffin batter in orange peel cups and so on, and we cook them in the fire and heat water for cocoa and tea and mull cider and cranberry juice. We often haul the the story ropes or beads, and there's always an altar setr up where we can sit and talk with Dea Nutrix or meditate.
Each House has also developed their own special Celebrations in addition to these. Our Celebrations are connected to our community, what's important to the people in the House and the things that happen to them.