We Wrote a Book!
What is our world missing? Connection. This little book asks us to look a bit deeper at ourselves and our shared modern customs to find the links that connect us all.
You can find our book here: TwasTheNightStory.com (a children’s book written for adults to learn about our shared heritages). And watch our videos talking about the background to our material and intentions on YouTube.
This became a fun way to share a blend of her-story and uncovering the natural origins of our holidays to understand better what stories I am telling to my own children.
Do YOU know why Santa comes down a chimney? Or why we tell a story to our kids we think is a lie? There is no doubt there is magic in Christmas, but what parts do we feel good leaning into? What customs do we want to perpetuate with these tales? How much of it is real?
Talk about passion project… this was just a first bite into a much larger topic. Imagined while reading as my sons fell asleep on me the last 3 years, and finally turned into a reality.
Twas the Night Before Solstice is our poetic re-imagination of the classic poem from 1823, submitted anonymously EXACTLY 200 years ago. The coolest thing about the original poem is that it was the first time we see Santa with Reindeer in the western conciousness. It becomes the perfect vessel to help share the origins of how the story of Santa made its way to us.
We joined a fun podcast with Flourish Academy on the actual night before solstice, talking about inspirations and diving into our pasts. I love talking with people so open to this topic.
And we attended a holiday markets to sell the book- and the interactions with real people is priceless. You see people’s minds expand- on the spot. People either uninterested, or TOTALLY inspired. You get used to rejection, but also start to refine your pitch to see what kind of story is accessible. If you can get someone to listen to you for 30 seconds, man, you can really reach them like no form of social media or flat piece of paper can do.
And I truly believe in this story and the meaning it has to tell. I want a world that can celebrate various cultures. I want us all to dive into our roots, because it is healthy! And we are living in the first time in her-story when we have the freedom AND ACCESS to this information dump known as the internet. I beleive we are in the midst of a cultural movement that will break open all the blocked structures of the recent past, to reveal more about ourselves than we were - or ever could have been- told about ourselves.
Book Events
…with our kids!
Sure, it can be a bit tricker in the moment to spend all day at a book fair outside, with you kiddos under 3 years old, but in the long run, I think these boys get so much out of spending the day with us learning to sell (and make!) a passion project. And I was so inspired by other families who say their sons would take naps under the table at trade shows. Talk about family membership experiences and learning to hussle!
Plus, the interaction with people is priceless. To see conversion happen in the moment is incredible. To have people to talk to about something you love so much- to tell a story you believe in and to practice and FIND your hook is invaluable. And the more I do it, the more I realize I am on to something. Thank you to everyone for your support in this whole thing. Thank you to the people who stopped and took an interest in our little red mushroom tent. <3
As our family holiday card written by my husband states, the book “quickly became a family affair.” Thank you Marcus. You are the best.
The Facts. The Timeline.
So here is just some of the her-story behind the makings of our story. Everything can be tied to cold hard dates. While we get to interpret the connection between dates (and the dates themselves can never be fully verified, because, well, it was the past and we have no truly trustworthy sources on anything regarding religion), we can start to gain a broader picture of what was going on in our past that got us to where we are today.
We have a few different threads we can follow.
We have the “sun worshipers” from all over the world from many THOUSANDS of years back. This thread is to show the original winter festival celebrations have a natural origin story that we - as a species, as WELL as a sharer of the planet with many other species- can all understand (ie, missing the sun in winter). Understanding the solstices, and counting down until days of warmth was of extreme importance to our ancestors.
We can dive into the symbolism of Santa that stems from the Siberian native tribes nearest the real North pole, and how they came into the American consciousness in the exact moment that Santa was forming in the West. This thread also naturally takes us to forms of psychedelics used around the world, especially in native tribes that passed on generational knowledge of using plant medicine safely and intentionally, and spiritually.
We also have the more scary thread- the one that debunks modern conceptions of our major religions. With historical information, we KNOW that the story of JC was not a spontaneous arrival- it was preceeded by thousands of years of replicated stories going back as far as ancient egypt (and probably way older, but our his-storical record stops here). We start to see we have much to pay homage to for any of our abrahamic religions (including christianity and islam) TO pagans (egyptians, greeks, druids, and every other plant/nature based “fertility cult” that worshipped the feminine life giving powers of the female body that mirrored the nature around her) AND Judaism (the oldest within the abrahamic religious threads).
And finally, we have the think that links everything together. The headlines and dates of major events that help paint a picture of what America was seeing and feeling in those decades leading to the creation of our modern traditions.
Mushroom Artwork - A pop culture icon
The amanitia mushroom has become a potent symbol in our culture- another example of loving a symbol without knowing the deeper meaning behind it. Either way, I love that the thread is still alive- that the spark of the fire is still burning, inviting later generations to look, if they are so inclined, to start passions up all over again, like they did for me. These beautiful little mushrooms stand for so much- but are intriguing and beautiful and mysterious all on their own.
And bieber just got a mega diamond-studded set for his anniversary from his wife, after already wearing several other mushroom icons, and selling them out in stores! Just to say, I think they will become even MORE popular in the next few years.
Not to mention… Katy Perry’s Mushroom performance on SNL??!
Other Kids Books featuring… our mushroom!
A surprising number of children’s books about nature showcase the amanita mushroom. It is a curious choice- even for companies like Disney, to put a psychadeleic murhooms so prominantly on covers and virtually ever page of their stories.
Maybe it is not suprising at all- cult favorites like Alice and Wonderland and Willy Wonka were born in an era of exploration and challenge to the status quo. And the more I re-watch these stories as an adult, I see the deeper messaging lost in kids in the story and imagery that has captured us for generations.
And maybe it is just a beautiful shocking thing to see in the wild, a red and white spotted mushroom. But for those willing to look further, the invitation of the mushroom to look deeper into the similies of exploring our own selves matches perfectly in an era that we need to start also get on the train to explore into sharing the world in a more eco-friendly manner. No matter if you beleive in climate change or not- or santa for that matter- there is obviously something there that has the mainstream captivated.
The Magic is in You
I love this thread. Knowing you are made of stardust, and a part of this master design just makes us feel connected as a species and ecosystem. Nobody can take away this magic from you.
“There is no line where you start and I end.”
Since there is SOME kind of design in the universe (what kind and by whom we will never know!)… then YOU are part of that design. The energy is shared with all of us, and you do NOT need anyone else to access it. A guide is nice, and that is what we see the real outline of Santa being- a person who helped guide visions, and we accidentally perpetuate this beautiful story without knowing it.
So what does it mean that we are all stardust? As physical beings, we are made up of the same molecules that pass in and out of every other rock and creature we share this life with. There is no line that delineates our bodies with anything else. Our skin is porous (has holes), we absorb food and water and light, and breathe out what other creatures (like plants) breathe in. We live in a beautiful cycle of zero waste (aside from the waste we have created that takes millions of years to break down). I should say, NATURAL cycles have no waste. The same stuff that makes the stars and asteroids and sun makes up you and me. When we pass on, our energy goes SOMEWHERE. Somewhere in this ecosystem. And aside from just our physical selves, we have so much more that lives on through memories and reactions and things we created or inspired in others.
Einstein once said, “You either see magic in everything, or nothing.” Modern science has this rhetoric that everything has to be mechanistic to be legit. But we are spritual beings also- placebo is real. Things we imagine in our minds comes into being. We are NOT machines. We are unpredictable. Any medicine- at its best- can try to remove obstacles and allow this amazing thing called healing and regeneration in our own bodies. We don’t really know how it works. The best kind of immunotherapies just try to kick that function into gear. So the mental part is extremely important, even in our day to day lives. Understand the magic is part of us, and we can harness it.
Museum Discoveries
You can always can find some spotted mushrooms!
Ones here from:
the Palo Alto Junior Museum
the Children’s Museum in San Jose
Discovery Museum in Sausilito
And What is all this about the Sun’s Birthday?
ALL OVER THE WORLD, people have celebrated the longest night of the year as the birthdate of the sun. After this LONG cold night (in the north, where 90% of the population lives), each day brings MORE light every day. And our calendar still revolves around this delineation of time. Our days and hours mark the sun’s movements as well, equally broken into hours of light and dark (nominally). Here are just some fun things we have been collecting to show off this love of the sun that so naturally feels good to us. Its influence on our modern religions are undeniable (when you dare to look). There is a theory that the first version of the cross was very pagan- a natural symbol that formed from rubbing two sticks together to create fire - a small piece of that ball of fire seen in the sky. Metaphors have been used time and time again, in all kinds of religious books. But we no longer see the sun as a metaphor for the Krist (christos that lived way before JC of the 0 AD christian era) symbols- but instead the modern saviors as symbols that represent the SUN. Blasphemy! mind blown. mic dropped.
