Today is the burning of Zozobra, it's also Rosh Hashanah.
Zozobra, for those of you that don't know, is Old Man Gloom. He's a giant, and I do mean GIANT paper man that is burned the first week of September in Santa Fe. It symbolizes letting go of the past year's gloom and bad luck and moving forward. Cleansing by fire. You can write your gloom down, basically a FML note and burn it along with Zozobra. When I was a kid the burning of Zozobra was slightly terrifying. He's giant, I'm not kidding, and kind of scary looking all on his own, then he burns. But I liked the thought behind it, the burning of your bad luck, your gloom, and then moving forward.
As I got older the fiesta got bigger and people like to drink at their giant puppet bonfires so it got to be a little more dangerous on the roads back to Albuquerque so we stopped going. I guess from what friends back home have said, it's a pretty rowdy affair now, people confusing burning Old Man Gloom with Burning Man I guess... But I still like the idea of it. I still like a time to just say, this is the stuff that sucked last year, now get rid of it!
And like I said, it's also Rosh Hashanah today so it actually is the start of a new year to boot! After my dream of having to defend my past year I think I am ready for a new one.
How about you? Are you ready to burn the past gloom off, eat some apples dipped in honey, and move forward with a better year?
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