Star Lady

It seems strange that there are no women represented in any holiday except Mother’s Day.

Why is it that Santa Brings all the presents and the male elves make all the presents when in fact women are the main source of shopping, cooking, wrapping, and general holiday activities? Isn’t it odd that Mrs. Santa doesn’t do much and is barely seen?

As a culture-creative, hippie-in-the-woods, I get to choose what I want to celebrate. With imagination, creativity and some dream time, I found the Star Lady. She came to me as I watched the stars cross the sky, and it seemed like a swirling gown of a huge black gown; the skirt of the Star Lady. She dances across the sky and with the Greenman they have a child every year; baby new year.

The Greenman was the ancient Santa. He was the old man of the woods. You see today all the homeless old men; in antiquity there were still homeless old men, they lived out in the woods. They were hungry in the dead of winter and as a way of getting something to eat, they would carve toys and leave them on the steps of houses that left a plate of food on the door step (cookies today). Or in symbolic processions, the Greenman (the man of nature) would follow the trinity of women dressing in red, green and white (the three stages of women-hood).  In the old days they would walk through the village with trays of food and candles in their hands while on their trailing gowns there would be presents. The Greenman would dole out the gifts or sometimes he would follow them in a sleigh. Women were taken out of ceremony and holidays during witch hunt massacre in the middle ages. Women disappeared from view, and that vacancy continues to this day.

Only allowed the power of attraction and mothering, women have remained in the shadows. To heal the years of ignorance and to stop the solidification of our culture into a senseless consumption of cheap thrills, I tell my daughter another story; we light candles and eat cookies., and at night I tell her about the Star Lady. She dances across the sky sprinkling star dust into our eyes and makes us sleepy. She is the beautiful night dancer, worthy of our love and admiration. And if you’re wise… Yoda brings you a gift.