Holiday, ritual and celebration

Holidays, rituals and celebrations are important.

That is my simple thesis. I was making my way into SF on BART Saturday night for a Halloween party and the scene on the BART train was reminiscent of Burning Man, everyone was in pretty ridiculous costumes and no one was batting an eye. It was fantastic. I'm sure there is some scholarly research done on the "why" of holidays, why do we do them? My arm-chair analysis is that historically a lot of them were based around harvests and seasons but they served a deeper purpose: as outlets.

The Tarahumara tribe of Mexico is known for having insanely low cancer rates, high physical fitness, and in communities that have been unscathed by the more corrupting of modernity's influences, no crime whatsoever. Scientists hypothesize that living this way for years has actually now made their brains rather incapable of lying! These are seemingly idyllic people but they also have rituals from time to time where they brew huge vats of corn beer and liquor and drink until the women tear each other's clothes off and wrestle to settle deep seated animosities and men, normally so polite and shy will grope and grab women. Take me there, holy shit. The point though is that celebrations and holidays are necessary for people. People who are creative, vibrant, seeking creatures who can sink into ruts and get bored and need the occasional change of pace switcheroo.

So keep dressing up and being weird every now and then!