Old gods

Consider the idea that even though they are both based on natural, observable phenomena, the calendar and the clock are arbitrary. It is true that the seasons change, Spring turns to Summer, Summer to Fall, Fall to Winter, and around again to Spring, but what reason is there for some months to have 30 days, some to have 31, and poor, maligned February to have but 28 (and sometimes 29)? On a natural calendar would it not make more sense for each “month” to have 28 days? There are at least two observable reasons for that number to make the basis of the month.

And what of the clock? Why 24 hours in a day? Why 60 minutes in an hour? It’s clear that the sun progresses across the Earth in an observable pattern and that in our desire to categorize we call one part of that progression something (day) and the other part something else (night), but why apply that number to it? There is no basis human physiognomy for the number 60; a normal human has 10 fingers and 10 toes, so why not the number 10 or the number 20? Every answer I’ve found for the question about the clock is truly a non-answer – because the ancient Sumerians traded money in a basis of 60; because the Earth is divided into latitudes and longitudes that are measured in minutes and seconds. This last one amuses me the most with its backwards order of things.

But even though the calendar and the clock are arbitrary, they allow us to predict with modest regularity things that happen every year, things that when we were small and cold and mostly naked creatures in all likelihood scared us almost to death. Indeed, without astronomy to tell us that in areas where there are seasons yes, the sun will indeed come back and the Earth will warm up again, we developed rituals as humans are wont to do.

The noise, the laughter, the gathering of the community close to drive out all those things that have been breeding and hiding in the dark corners that have only gotten darker since harvest time. Blood on snow for the unlucky bastard who got a bean in his dinner, the necessary sacrifice to make the sun rise again. And because we are human, because we inherently recognize, even if we insist with vigor the contrary, that we don’t control everything in our world, we invented a god for whom these rituals must be done.

But then we got wise and discovered astronomy, and physics, and horticulture, and that the same patterns keep repeating. The day will get shorter, to a point, and then start getting longer without fail, without question, it always does. Yet…the part of us that never grew up, the part that pushed us to progress from the frightened mammal in the cave to the civilized people behind wavy glass whose homes were lit by modern gas lamps, to the species that dared leave the planet to explore, the part of us that kept us whole and safe in those dark, cave-bound times still believes that we must do what is necessary or things just will not happen.

Old gods do new jobs. Blood on the snow becomes the red velvet suit trimmed in white fur. Cacophony to drive away that which lurks in the shadows becomes carols about silver bells and sleigh rides. Huddling for warmth and to make the fear just a little bit less sharp becomes the open house and a moderately acceptable $9 bottle of wine and oh look, they have a cheese ball again this year.

Tomorrow “day” will be 2 seconds longer than today; the data prove it.

The one that matters is that second to last one, length of visible light. The rest is measured against our arbitrary clock and our arbitrary calendar.

In four days kids in the Northern Hemisphere will wake up to presents left by Santa, stockings filled with trinkets and things wished for and perhaps needed, plates with cookie crumbs and glasses slimed with the remains of milk downed hours ago prove the elf showed up and did his job. They will wake up on a day with more visible light than the one before and the one before that.

Old gods do new jobs.