gothidays & books...scary ghost stories and tales of the glories

*MY* Ideal Bookshelf commissioned by Jane Mount

On the fifth day of Gothidays (check out the logo! Participate!), I’m writing about holiday stories—ghost stories and Christmas stories. 

As an English Literature professor, I love a good book. "Good" is actually pretty relative. When I first heard about the Ideal Bookshelf, I immediately commissioned one for my fella. This was the perfect type of tangible gift that I could give him. It turns out that it was one of his first Christmas gifts before we switched over to giving the gift of time. We both loved his Ideal Bookshelf so much that I decided that I had to have one too. When I selected my books for my *Ideal Bookshelf*, I chose the books that touched my heart. There are tons of books that I love; these eight have personal meaning. A few of these even saved my life.

Nearly every holiday, I attempt to make some type of reading connection because nothing sets the tone like a good book. 

Last year I mentioned the lyrics of Andy Williams’ classic “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year,” that acknowledges the tradition. “There’ll be scary ghost stories and tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago.” Many of you have read Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. If you haven’t, I highly recommend it. In fact, I think you might even want to plan a gathering to listen to Neil Gaiman read A Christmas Carol just as Dickens read it. My fella and I did that last year during Christmas and it was a great deal of fun.

For years, I have read a Christmas book during the season. From David Baldacci’s The Christmas Train to Christopher Moore’s The Stupidest Angel to Richard Paul Evans’ Lost December to The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries ed. Penzler, I love a good Christmas story. This year for my horror book club, I read Michael Dougherty’s  Krampus: Shadow of Saint Nicholas (2015).  Dougherty is the writer/director of Trick r’ Treat the Krampus movie, which I thoroughly enjoyed.  

Krampus: Shadow of Saint Nicholas

Krampus: Shadow of Saint Nicholas is the prequel graphic novel which tells four separate but sort of related Krampus tales. There are four chapters that revolve around a “bad Santa”, a sister’s death, a homeless family seeking shelter in a rich person’s home, and the fourth chapter that is an attempt to connect the three stories. Honestly, I would have been fine if the stories had been left completely separate but as with     Trick r’ Treat this seems to be Dougherty’s style.

Because the graphic novel was a quick read, I also picked up Brom’s Krampus: The Yule Lord. I just started this last week but I'm pretty sure that I will finish the entire book before this post is scheduled to be published. [Follow up: yep, I finished it on 12/09/2015). I have really enjoyed it and unless the ending is completely off the point I highly recommend it. 

If you’re not the reading type or perhaps you’ve caught on the bandwagon with the coloring book craze. Thank goodness my personal reader aka my fella pulls out articles for me to read. The Atlantic’s November 2015 article “The Zen of Adult Coloring Books” explains how this has become so popular. Albeit, I believe the author’s argument veers away from mindfulness i.e. if you aren’t paying attention to the television show, why not do something else? And, if you have a coloring book in front of you, shouldn’t you be paying attention to it? Anyway. The book that started the craze, "Secret Garden: An Inky Treasure Hunt and Coloring Book," has sold over 2 million copies. Even my mother is coloring. I wouldn’t even mention this trend if it weren’t for these two books. The first is Richard E. Todd’s Cemetery Coloring Book: A cemetery inspired coloring book for taphophiles (September 2015).  The second, which is only available for pre-order for May 2016, is Abigail Larson’s Alice's Wonderfilled Adventures: A Curious Coloring Book for Adults.

gothidays memories...the wedding that never was...

For the fourth day of Gothidays I’m focusing on Winter Solstice.

Last year I was thinking of Winter Solstice because my fella and I had been planning to marry on solstice day. Of course, life happened and we ended up marrying in October which was *my dream*, not necessarily his.

To know me is to know that I LOVE holidays! And as a huge Bing Crosby fan (I know! That’s so very goth, right! ;P ) I love the movie Holiday Inn. When my fella and I decided to get married, a quick Google search took me to one of the top destination wedding locations in Virginia, The Holladay House Bed & Breakfast.  Pretty much because of the name (the closest thing to a Holiday Inn like the movie), I knew this was where we were going to get married. 

A Winter Solstice wedding had been important for him because he liked the idea of getting married on the darkest of days (or at least more hours of the day being in darkness) and being able to weather that together. When I think of the solstice, I think of winter white and icicles. I did not want to wear white so I opted for red. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I realize that is more of a Christmas color but when I think of nature during the winter, I think red berries and green fir, spruce, and even Wintergreen barberry. I have to admit that while it was supposed to be a Winter Solstice themed wedding, I am a Christmas girl and planned to bring a bit more of the Christmas spirit to the wedding that my fella had probably hoped. I even made a Christmas ornament bouquet that I think turned out beautifully considering I had no idea what I was doing. In my defense, doesn’t the Christmas season derive from the Solstice season?!? Or something like that ;D

I didn’t end up wearing my red dress. In fact, it’s still unaltered hanging in my closet but I’m not supposed to give it away because it would hurt my fella’s heart. We have sooo many anniversaries, and one of them is the anniversary of the day in this parallel world where we did marry. My ornament bouquet which I had considered selling because in my opinion it did turn out quite good still sits in my office in a plastic bag because of that parallel universe. I should probably shadow box it. You can see the dress and also our wedding and bridal portraits by the talented artist Abigail Larson in my post … the ghosts of Christmas (Winter Solstice) wedding future….

These are by Lisa at MiaettiaCreations’ on Etsy. I had seen some of her Custom Wedding Hair Clips & Boutonnieres on Off Beat Bride and on Pinterest. She makes these beautifully elaborate hair pieces out of paper. Most of her creations are flowers. Her spider originally caught my eye and perhaps I will contact her to see if she would be willing to do a custom order of a Christmas spider. Her Dia Los Muertos Wedding hair clip skull caught my eye and after that I knew I needed a custom order.

I ordered two hair clips for my friend and me, and a boutonniere for my best man. I ended up adding my hair clip to my bouquet which fit into my Halloween wedding just fine and because the wedding only included my fella and me, I ended up keeping all of the MiaettiaCreations pieces. They’re now in a shadowbox.  

Lisa included a Harold Pinter poem around the edge. I think it resonates with my relationship.

"I know the place.
It is true.
Everything we do
Corrects the space
Between death and me
And you.”
~ Harold Pinter

Celebrating what would have been our wedding night (Winter Solstice) with my fella.                                            Every girl should get to wear her bat veil at least twice ^o^

Now on the Winter Solstice, my fella and I celebrate our anniversary-that-might-have-been. To the left is a picture of my outfit for last year's celebration. We returned to the Bed & Breakfast where we were married and even ate at the same restaurant. 

gothidays & nights: you better watch out; you better not cry! Krampus is coming to town

I actually learned about Krampus through collecting traditional Christmas ornaments.   

For the second day of The Curious Professor Z's Gothidays event (see the fancy picture to the left!), I'm going to discuss the celebration of Krampus! 

If you’ve followed my blog for at least a year, you know that I have a slight obsession with Old World Christmas ornaments. 

In years past, I’ve had my wrought iron Christmas tree, which I still have but with two households combined into one townhouse we just don’t have the room. Last year was the first time that I put my precious ornaments on a regular (okay, they’re not that regular) artificial tree. I wrote in more detail about this last year in my post, ... oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree... In that post, I included the quote from Old World Christmas, 

"Devils with red faces, horns and tails often played a significant role in early German Christmas celebrations. Paradise plays performed during the holiday season in medieval times depicted life and death, the Garden of Eden, and good and evil."

I learned about the tradition of placing devils and/or Krampus ornaments on my tree from the shopkeeper in my local shop Old World Accents in Carytown. She told me about the German tradition; and, she basically introduced me to Krampus. It was at that point that I started collecting the ornaments and became affectionately known as “Devil Girl” by the shopkeeper.   

Krampus Puppet by Lily Lamberta, All the Saints Theater Company/

 picture by my fella

picture by my fella

Krampusnacht or Krampus Night is traditionally celebrated on December 5th, the eve of St. Nicholas Day. Unlike our American Santa who has the naughty or nice list, this traditional St. Nicholas doesn’t trouble himself with the naughty children. He leaves that up to ol’ Krampus who supplies coal and the ruten bundles. 

On Krampusnacht, people dress as Krampus and roam the streets looking for someone to beat with a stick.

Krampus events seem to have caught on in the U.S. This year, Richmond, VA celebrated its third annual Krampusnacht. 
 

Photo: Dave Parrish ~used with permission

Not only that, but again this year RVA Krampus featured Yuletide Monsters 2: A Krampus Art Show the night before at a local gallery. There were Krampus-themed paintings, prints, drawings, sculptures, masks and puppets along with music and a market. Local artist Abigail Larson had a piece in the show as well. 

My fella and I fell in love with two of the pieces so much that he bought them! Yay! 

artist: Nicolas Bryant

artist: Kyle Katherjohn

Participants of RVA Krampus also participated in a toy drive where we collected toys for the Scares that Care organization AND the RVA Horror Book Club read Michael Dougherty’s Krampus: Shadow of Saint Nicholas for our monthly read. On Saturday morning, I even went to see the movie Krampus. Needless to say, it was an extremely full weekend.

I've already received some curious and even some problematic questions from coworkers and Facebook friends. "Isn't Krampus Satanic?"... ummm??? No. For starters, Krampus isn’t “the devil.” He is older than Jesus!

Stick with me a moment because I promise not to get too preachy. In the Bible, Satan as a character doesn’t even appear until the Book of Job where he is portrayed as a servant not a nemesis of God. During the time of Jesus, the devil had become the great scapegoat for all that goes wrong in the world. For many Christians today, Satan aka the Devil still holds that position. When they say, “The devil made me do it,” they mean it. But, that isn’t what I was taught.  

Raised in a Catholic household with a father who is old school Catholic (e.g. Mass in Latin), Dad said that there isn’t any demon that is equal to God. He also said that he loves being Catholic because we believe in miracles. That in itself is pretty darn cool.

Photo: Dave Parrish ~used with permission

Demons are pests; they are nuisances. The Devil may be their leader but we have freewill and we have responsibility. Basically, “the devil made me do it” excuse that some use…well, my dad throws down the bullshit card and I have to agree with him.

My dad is pretty darn religious. He loves Halloween. When I dress up for Krampus activities, my dad is going to shake his head and laugh. There is nothing Satanic about the festivities because well, Krampus pre-dates Satan. It's a wild and raucous night.For me, I'm participating in another culture's traditions hopefully doing so with respect.

While I'm super psyched about Krampus making such an appearance this year, I am nervous about the commercialization that has already begun. Sigh. That completely defeats the purpose. 

Photo: Dave Parrish ~used with permission

Overall, it was an amazing weekend and my fella feels like we even found another holiday to celebrate. Well, you know me, I LOVE holidays!