Things the Pagans Got Right

To the extent that preadolescent boys think about funerals much, they tend to like the supposed Viking funeral—having your body laid in a longboat, and then having the boat set out on the falling tide and set on fire. This doesn't seem to correspond to historical accounts, but I'm getting used to that. The important thing is to be 14 and think this was once an option and feel comforted by how cool people used to be 1500 years ago.

That said, I was thinking about how it's the day after Christmas and in a short time the trees—still decorated as sumptuously as money and imagination can contrive—will be taken down, stripped of their ornaments, and dragged out to the curb, where they will lie ignominiously, a few leftover strands of tinsel shimmering in the cold, hard breeze. That seems like a shame, to me. Will I be drummed out of the Sierra Club if I suggest that it would be fun to collect them in a huge communal pyre and torch them? We could beat drums and drink and chant as the flames rose into the night sky, a fierce challenge to the darkness of the night. I think it's good to be in touch with your inner pagan—and if not at the solstice, well, just exactly when, I'd like to know?