I'm Just Sayin'

I've never really put much importance in the acknowledgement of anniversaries. I am in the minority...the very small, itsey bitsey, microscopic minority. Most folks love to observe the passing of a period of one calendar year from a specific starting point. We are observing New Years Day today. It's been a year since the last New Years Day, so we have cause to celebrate. We do the same with birthdays and wedding anniversaries and other stuff. The magic number is one year...365 days. When 365 days pass, we will observe another New Year's Day,  and change the number of the year to 2009. I'm kind of mystified by this. Maybe we are just event junkies? Maybe we just can't believe we actually made it...survived another year. Maybe we are comforted in the fact that, while we have grown another year older, so has everybody else. At any rate, the achievement  of being here one more year, is cause for celebration.

Looking  back at history we see the fascination with time  is really the fascination with the movement of the (our planets...near to our sun) planets and the resulting seasons. Once man figured out how our planetary system moved, he was able to record the passing of the longest and shortest days of sunlight and he found a pattern. Pick a starting point...wait 365 days and whammo, you are back at your starting point. The earth has returned to the same location it was a year ago...let's party. I'm poking fun at a very serious matter for the ancient people. They had to have a means by which they could plan for their planting of crops, storing of food, preparation for changes in weather and all that goes along with better efficiency regarding the orderly production of life's necessities.

So what's the big deal with a celebration today? Tradition. We just love to observe traditions.  Joseph Campbell says that without tradition, without the rituals we have put into place, we would be less grounded. We would feel less secure and less focused. We need order and we need insight into what is going to happen to us. Such is the nature of religion also. We need answers to questions to which there are no answers and we need to believe that we are important and that we will live on. Those questions which have no answers...you know them, the big three...where did we come from, what is our purpose and where are we going....make us feel uncertain and afraid. So we have come up with answers. They aren't the real answers, but just fill in answers or "feel good" answers. We don't all believe the same fill in answers, but generally those answers are...we were created by god, we are here to serve him and we are going to join him if we have done a good job of serving him. Religion is tradition and ritual. New Year's Day observance...tradition and ritual.

Now that the fire crackers have been blown up and the roman candles have been shot and the sparklers have sparkled and the  toasts have been offered and count down is over, it's time for the other tradition of January 1, any year...college football bowl games.