One of the things in life which my mother taught, God rest her soul, is to pursue without limitations anything worth pursuing. She was an avid genealogist, and the work she did on her family tree gave impetus to start my own tree.
Most people do not begin their family genealogy until they are older, and have time on their hands because genealogy takes time and patience.
I cannot remember when I first started the family tree. It was some time long ago, back in the late 1960's. In later life I began to pursue it more judiciously.
I am most proud of the fact I came to know myself and understand my family a little clearer after tracing the family back to old Scotland. When I became aware of this fact, I began to call myself a Scots-American like thousands of other people who came to this country from Scotland through Ireland.
One of the last gleanings after discovering Scotland as the homeland of my ancestors was some of the traditions they celebrated. One of them happens to be the Christmas and New Year's celebrations or lack thereof. They brought these traditions with them when they came to the New America.
Not until 1958 did Scotsman celebrate Christmas as we do now. Older Scots believed Christmas was a pagan celebration, and there is enough evidence of it being a pagan belief.
Scots were mostly Protestants, and Christmas was brought about by the Roman Catholic Church. To Catholics, in those days, it was a "Christ Mass". The Scots fought England largely upon religious principle, and to follow the Catholic Church was considered "popery." The Scots believed in religious freedom and fought for it through many wars.
Up until 1958, however, older Scots celebrated what they called Hogmanay.
Most Scots worked over the Christ Mass celebrations until the New Year. The "party" was the New Year, which was a pre-Christian celebration.
Hogmanay has always been important to Scots. It is still celebrated in the streets and villages of Scotland today.
For many years it was customary to lavish gifts on friends and relatives on New Year's Eve. There is often the firing of a canon, and the sounding of a ship's siren to indicate midnight. It is then traditional to leave your own house and visit your neighbors.
In doing so, it was and is important to take some gifts with you; a bottle of whiskey, a lump of coal and some type of food. Traditionally oatcakes, black bun or shortbread were the foods of choice.
Those Scotsmen who stayed home generally hoped that the first person to visit them would be tall, dark and handsome. It was a throwback to Viking days when blond strangers arriving on your doorstep meant trouble. (I wondered where those blond jokes came from).
It was also a tradition that you should clear all your debts before you saw the New Year. This was to be a clean break, a fresh start. (What a great concept seeing that we are all in debt up to our ears).
The idea of firecrackers on New Year's Eve was brought to the New World by Celts.
Bond fires were lit in Scotland and, a traditional "Calling of the Clans." Scots came from every nook and cranny, hurling their torches onto a massive heap of wood. As the flames joined and reached toward the sky, battle cries filled the night air. Once all the Clans were announced and accounted for, the festivities began.
I guess the Scots' blood in me runs thick as I have always, for some reason, not been fully spirited when it comes to the Christmas holidays. The commercialism it stirs in all of us. The birth of Jesus gives it a great symbolical meaning, but historians agree Jesus was not born on December 25th. He was either born in the Fall or Spring. No one really knows when Jesus was born.
So I have thought for years Christmas was a pagan idea we celebrate.
From the Babylonian times of the Old Testament stands the epitome of everything that is godless or perverse. In the New Testament, Babylon becomes Rome. The Roman Empire embodies the pagan beliefs and practices of ancient Babylon, and we in America are repeating history, like we never learned it, and are becoming like the Rome of yesteryear.
The American Empire, as we know it, is following the path of Rome. Our once democratic way of life is transitioning into a beast of an animal. Our society is breaking up piece by piece, and the terrorists in the East are having a field day with it.
You can see it happening all over America as "Christ" is being taken out of Christmas. People prefer now to say "Happy Holidays." The Christmas we once knew as children is taking a backseat to other religions or non-religious people.
Since it is a pagan celebration to begin with, it is time to break with the old traditions.
A Happy Hogmanay sounds better, at least to us Scots-Americans.
God bless us all since we can all trace our beginnings back to God. What a great family tree!