I have had the great privilege to observe Midsommar in
Sweden a few years ago. In that part of the world, The Land of the Midnight
Sun, it's an important and widely celebrated holiday. The family we visited had
a midday meal outside. They always ate outside on Midsommar (I'm using the
Swedish spelling because I like it), no matter what the weather was.
"There is no bad weather, only bad clothes." On that day, we wore
winter coats.
We were greatly warmed, though, by the "branvin",
some kind of strong alcohol. When Papa would ring a little bell, everyone would
sing a song--they ranged from raucous to naughty--and drink some of the branvin.
We Americans were slugging back the whole tiny glass until we noticed that the
Swedes were sipping theirs. We changed our ways, but were already half in the
tank.
During the meal the young men left the table and gathered
wildflowers. The tradition is that they gather 7 different kinds of flowers and
weave a garland for their girlfriends' heads. This is no problem because there
are dozens of different kinds of wildflowers on the hills near their West coast
home. One of them wove one for me, too, and I wore it the rest of the day.
After the meal, we all trooped down to the churchyard for a
pagan ceremony. A large pole, festooned with greenery and flowers rested on the
ground. It had a crosspole, with two loops that hung from it. Rather phallic
looking. Especially when it was slooowly raised while the people sang and began
dancing around it. We sang more silly songs, including the national favorite, Små grodorna or Little Frogs. Some musicians played accordion and violin. Even
after it started raining, they played on and we danced on. The Swedes are
hardy people!
NEW SUBJECT: Well, an old subject revisited. The second edition of CHOKE is now available in trade paperback! I'm excited about my new
cover depicting the town of Saltlick and Huey's Hash. Stay tuned for news of
the sequel, later this month.
Midsummer dance picture from Wikipedia.
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