Last Sunday’s Platform marked the end of our “Humanist For The Holidays” celebrations, a three week series of Sunday meetings beginning with “Winter Festival” on December 15, then the Ethical Sing-A-Long on December 22 and culminating with the “Do Tell! Diner” on December 29.
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At the DoTell! Diner, participants brought a dish to share and told a true story that went with the dish. We heard some wonderful stories about the food people brought. Here is a sampling:
- Eric talked about the time when his grandma ate the brownies…yeah, those kind of brownies!
- Susan spoke about her family’s long history of canning spaghetti sauce.
- Janet reminisced about going hungry in Hungary as a vegetarian until she found the Roumanian cabbage salad that was present everywhere.
- Beth and Perry shared their story about “dittos”, a family term for steak sandwiches, and the time Perry wanted to surprise Beth by making “dittos”, but couldn’t find the “ditto meat”.
- Caryl talked about sending trail mix to camp with her son, who was told to put it under his bunk only to wake up to find a skunk enjoying it!
- Diane spoke about foraging for black walnuts and the effort needed to extract the walnut meat from the shell
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These stories only heightened the taste of the food as we then shared the potluck as a community.
At the Winter Festival celebrating the solstice, our community sang, played music, wrote winter poetry, and wrapped yarn around the Giving Tree. The Giving Tree’s focus this year was a food drive for the Center for Food Action (CFA); our community collected several boxes and bags of food as well as over $400 for the CFA.
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At the Ethical Sing-A-Long, the “Ethical Music Makers” led the morning as the community sang through songs suggested by the audience. We had a diverse selection including traditional holiday songs, songs from the civil rights era and even some pop standards. There was a lot of energy in the room and our community felt uplifted.
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That is how our Ethical humanist community came together for the holidays. Please join us next year for the festivities; we look forward to celebrating with you.