In case you missed it, the Solstice occurred at 5:44 AM EST-2:44 AM Left Coast time.

How many of you have spent even one really black dark night with no visible bright lights? Even campgrounds have lights around the restrooms and of course campers who once brought lanterns now light their sites like the living room with LEDs.

I confess I panic when the electricity goes off. Fortunately I live downtown and the lines are underground so power outages are rare. In our era its hard to emotionally grip the meaning that the the Winter Solstice once had. Neanderthal man never wandered far from the cold climate of North Central Europe for the 125,000 years of his existence and never saw a light after dark save a small camp fire. Homo Sapiens picked up camp from Africa and populated the earth before lamps or even flickering candles were invented.

FDR's Rural Electrification Project was put on hold due to WWII and the my families Appalachian mountain cove farm didn't get electricity until the early 50s. When the sun went down it got dark,really dark, and houses were widely spread so you wouldn't have even seen the dim smoky coal oil lamp burning in a remote cabin window. Seventy years ago, a mere moment in time, great swaths of the US were dark at night. Yet I spent two summers 03-04 sailing the remote waters of British Columbia anchoring away from towns and cities most nights and found myself completely isolated from any electric lights on just one night.

Even with daylight on demand I find the short days depressing. I'm a SADD person. Put youself, if you can, in the normal position of humankind huddled around a small fire with little shelter watching the days get shorter and shorter. Consider how glorious it was to mark the shortest day and know that "Father Sun" looked favorably on you and would once again return to brighten your days. In their world Father Sun the bringer of light and life was a deeply spiritual fact of life but it's also a totally rational scientific fact as well. After all if somehow the plug got pulled on good old Sol we would begin dying very rapidly eight minutes later.

I suggest that the Winter Solstice is the master holiday, the reason for the season if you will, and that all the other holidays are not clustered around it by accident. Yesterday I made the rather un-PC mistake of wishing someone a Merry Christmas who rather pointedly did not respond. In retrospect I suspect the Solstice may actually be her celebration. Despite the kerfuffle over the appropriate greeting for the season I hope we can find at least one thing to agree on. Our winter holidays are centered around a rational event, the Winter Solstice, and we are free to celebrate them rationally or spiritually as is our custom and choice.

The sun made a token appearance here in Olympia WA at 8:00 O'clock then quickly disappeared in a rising fog. Despite the gloom and doom you will read for the rest of the day, the Sun did rise this morning right on schedule. May your days be merry and brighter. Happy Solstice.