More Gratuitous Holiday Grumbling - BUMPED AND UPDATED

Tomorrow during lunch I'll be scooting over to the Smithsonian, there to meet the youngest Llama-ette and her classmates from St. Marie of the Blessed Educational Method for a little holiday field-trip.

I just looked up the program we're going to see, the Seasons of Lights, and already my rant-worthy sensors are spiking:

Join our 9th annual multicultural celebration of global winter holidays rooted in the warmth and wonders of light. Learn the history and customs of Ramadan, Devali, Chanukah, Sankta Lucia, Kwanzaa, Las Posadas/Christmas and a First Nations tradition of Winter Solstice in our most popular performance of the year. Embrace the season and be a part of the festivities—with audience participation for all.

Malkin's going to blow a gasket if she notices that Christmas only gets shared billing with Las Posadas. And who wants to place bets on whether anybody will mention the fact that "Kwanzaa" was fadged up by a crackpot in California back in the '60's and is based on a vision of half-baked socialist Pan-Africanism that is not only unsupportable, but is in fact downright fraudulent. Anybody? Anybody? Bueller?

Oh, but it goes deeper than that:

People all over the world celebrate holidays at this time of year. Many of these holidays honor the harvest, signal the New Year, or bring families together to remember the past and look forward to the future. Many holidays are also rooted in the coming of the shortest day of the year—the Winter Solstice.

Today, we often enjoy holiday traditions without knowing where they came from. We sing songs, display colored lights, and repeat special activities with friends and family. Holly wreaths, chocolate coins, sharing special foods, giving gifts, candles lit in a row— these traditions all herald the ending of one year, and the renewal and hope of looking ahead to the next.

If we look deeper, we see that these holidays carry echoes of earlier times, hundreds or thousands of years ago. At some point, the warmth of light burning in the dark plays a central role. The joy, warmth, and safety that came from these traditional gatherings kept the dark and cold at bay. They helped people understand that the sun would return and bring the promise of spring and a new year.

See? We're really all Gaia's Children after all. Why can't we just get along?

Remind me to take an extra dose of my meds tomorrow morning.........

UPDATE: Well, we saw the show. Let me put it this way: In pursuit of plurality over everything, I believe the show managed to thoroughly confuse all the kids and offend most of the adults.

Yeesh.

YIPS from Steve-O: Well Robbo, the only answer then is to get radished....

''

And here's something to cleanse the palatte after your experience at a Kwanza Carol: