Jan. 4--10th Day of Xmas--"St." Distaff's Day

Let’s get one date straight: most sources put “St. Distaff’s Day” on January 7th, after the Twelve Days are over.  This makes a lot of sense, too, because it’s supposed to be the first day back to work after all the Christmas festivities.  But one of my sources says that it’s the Tenth Day of Christmas, and no one says anything else whatsoever about the Tenth Day in particular, and so for the purposes of this blog, let the Tenth belong to the saint called "Distaff"….

…Who never existed.  A distaff is a stick around which fiber to be spun into thread is wound—to keep it from getting tangled, you see.  So this back-to-work Day of Christmas (or after it) is named for something women worked with all the time.  Indeed, as a modifier noun, “distaff” can mean “of or pertaining to women”...So you have the "distaff (female)" side of the family, and the "spear (male)" side.  Of course, many women dislike the term because of its association with stereotypical women's work....Anyway, because “Distaff Day” was one of the days of Christmas, medieval folk started to call it “St. Distaff’s Day” as a joke.  So this is in fact a women’s day, except that it commemorates, well...that they have to go back to work. 

Nevertheless, the idea behind St. Distaff’s Day is not so cut and dried: time to get back to work, but not time to forget the fun of the Twelve Days.  You see, before Christmas became the orgy of gift buying and giving that it is today, adults got some little knickknacks, maybe, but the only ones who got “presents” were very small children.  With no shopping to do, that left a lot of time open for playing parlor games, for singing  and for laughing hard and often.  So even when the women got back to their spinning, weaving and sewing (since mothers were pretty much a one-woman sweatshop of thread, cloth and clothing manufacture at that time), the men made a game of trying to set fire to their hard-wrought textiles.  The women, for their part, kept large buckets of icy water handy to put out whatever flaming object was proffered—and douse the firebug as well!  Wee—hoo!  This is how Saint Distaff became the non-existent patron saint of practical jokes.

Mind you, this also adds St. Distaff's Day pranks to the role reversals and flour fighting and other zany, madcap revels that pop up regularly during the Twelve Days.  This un-Puritanical bit of fun gets us through the long, dark, cold days, and the figure of Jesus, as I have mentioned before, is revealed to have, or at least condone, a sense of humor and fun. 

...So, whenever it is you need to get back to work after the holidays, or even if you have to work the whole way through, you poor bastard--try to bring an uncommon level of fun to your days of toil.  I would discourage you from dumping a bucket of the wet stuff over your boss (unless you really can--in which case, have at it!), but you can (you must) adapt the principle of the thing to your circumstances.  Bring a joke book to work.  Wear a funny button or t-shirt.  Do the squirting flower gag.  Share lots of funny memes with coworkers and inter-networking friends.  Pull as many pranks as you can without getting divorced or fired.  Don’t let drudgery have its monopoly without a fight.  Give it wit, give it humor—give it mirth!  People will wonder if you have enlisted some chemical assistance in your battle for happiness, but so what?  Keep it light, keep it green.  

Above all, keep all Twelve Days of Christmas.  Two more to go.

The distaff is associated with women, yes, but in an interesting twist also reveals the Norse All-Father God, Odin (one of the most powerful beings in the Marvel multiverse!) as the equivalent of a cross-dresser.  You won't find Odin wielding a distaff in a Marvel movie, but you will find Loki mocking him, in an Icelandic saga, for using one in magickal rituals. You see, there was a brand of magic in the Old Norseland which made use of the distaff as a magical tool, sort of like a magic wand or staff or cauldron.  For a male to use this kind of magick was considered distinctly unmasculine--but Odin is the kind of guy who would pursue greater wisdom, knowledge and power at any cost.  He had already sacrificed one of his eyes, plus hung upside-down from a tree with a spear lodged in him for nine days in the pursuit of wisdom and mystical power--Loki's taunts weren't going to stop him.  In my mind, this makes Odin a patron saint of gender equality, of sorts, and balances out just a tad the relatively minor role that Norse goddesses play in the Norse myths that have survived to this day (to be fair, most of the myths we know of were recorded by a Christian monk, who may have redacted them heavily to equal the patriarchal one-sidedness of the Judeo-Christian Bible).

Why mention Odin at all in the context of the Twelve Days of Christmas?  Well, because, as the All Father, he bears a resemblance to Yahweh, the father of Christ.  He also is part of the source material for our contemporary legends of Santa Claus....You see, little Norse children would put their shoes outside, and fill them with hay for Odin's flying eight-legged horse Sleipnir (instead of 8 reindeer, eight legs!) as he rode the skies in mid-winter.  They would get little gifts in return.  Sound familiar?  Odin is also pictured, often, as a man with a white beard, and, like Santa, is associated with magical gifts.  And of course, Odin is associated with the cold North.

Incidentally, Loki's mocking of Odin's distaff magic may come from his own icky place inside, his own shame at an unmanly deed--as Sleipnir was Loki's own offspring, from that time when he'd had to, in order to get the gods out of a jam, change himself into a mare to lure a giant's stallion away from Asgard.  He got so far into the role that he, still in mare form, gave birth to the eight-legged colt Sleipnir a while later.  Even though he gave the colt as a gift to the All Father, you'd best believe he caught some hell for it during the feasting and drinking in Valhalla!

MUSICAL CHOICES  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdartdqjh56AHAVSW7w5IcX7xYU6l3lYo : 
 "Work B***ch" by Britney Spear (zumba by The Fitness Marshall and friends);
"Work" by Iggy Azalea (traducida en Español);
"Manic Monday" by  The Bangles;
"Back To Life" by Soul II Soul;
"9 to 5" by Dolly Parton with lyrics;
"I Don't Wanna Go To Work" by Lissie;
"Handbags & the Gladrags" by Rod Stewart;
"Atlantic City" by Bruce Springsteen;
"22 Grand Job" by The Rakes;
"Handyman Blues" by Billy Bragg;
"Bang the Drum All Day" (Live) by Todd Rundgren;
"Step Into My Office, Baby" by Belle & Sebastian;
"When I'm Cleaning Windows" performed by the late and great Peter Sellers on ukulele, and (original) by George Formby;
"Cleaning Windows" by Van Morrison;
"Witchita Lineman" by Glen Campbell
"Career Opportunities" (sung by children with The Clash);
"Career Opportunities" by The Clash;
"Spinning Wheel" by Blood, Sweat and Tears;


Folk Music about spinning & weaving: 
"The Band of Shearers" by Broceliande;  
Finbar and Eddie Furey - Dance Around The Spinning Wheel, 
The Hand-Loom Weavers Lament - Harry Boardman, 
The Island Spinning Song (Alastair o' the Dun) from the Forth Bridges Dance Band, 
Paddy Keenan, At First Light 
& Brian Haitz - Maid at the Spinning Wheel, The Maid at the Spinning Wheel, 
Catherine Ann MacPhee - O Hi Ri Lean, 
The Doffing Mistress - Anne Briggs cover - Traditional Folk Song,
Rabbie Burns - Tae the weavers gin ye gan,

Slim Whitman - The Old Spinning Wheel (Live), 
Phil Coulter - The Spinning Wheel, 
Dixon Brothers- Weave Room Blues,
Steeleye Span -  The weaver and the factory maid, 
Wee Weaver - Steeleye Span, 
The Spinning Wheel - Eileen Donaghy