Comments on: Countdown to Blastoff http://blog.burningman.com/2012/08/building-brc/countdown-to-blastoff/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=countdown-to-blastoff Wed, 19 Jun 2013 19:03:44 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 By: Nancy A. Hall http://blog.burningman.com/2012/08/building-brc/countdown-to-blastoff/comment-page-1/#comment-63839 Nancy A. Hall Wed, 29 Aug 2012 00:05:17 +0000 http://blog.burningman.com/?p=20876#comment-63839 I wonder how many other people had an old man like mine? Our family moved from an island off the coast of Maine to Alaska in 1967 when I was a teenager. After a while, Fathah got a job as a section gang worker on the Ak Railroad, so he worked outside year round. After a few years, it occured to him that it might be a good idea to observe the Vernal Equinox in a significant way, specifically by having a burning of winter’s garment. So he took one of his suits of long underwear & stuffed it full of highly combustible materials, put it on a stake, & stuck it in our backyard in Anchorage,with some gunpowder on top of the whole shebang. Then, on the evening of the Equinox the family & our friends gathered to eat, drink, & make merry, recite original poetry, incantations, songs, etc until finally Father would recite the words required to (hopefully) cast off winter’s garment, & touch off the stuffed underwear. It always flared up magnificently & then exploded with a major bang…after which some bolder individuals liked to jump through or over it. This ritual is still being carried out each Vernal Equinox, in my brother’s backyard now, since our parents have both passed away about 15 yrs ago. My brother(s) know how to go about it ofcourse. I always think about this whenever I hear news about Burning Man Festival. Probably someone from those long ago days of our first Vernal Equinox ceremonies has gone to BM, but I’m not inclined b/c there’s no ocean around there.

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