Merry
Christmas to all friends, clients and casual visitors to
kenrinkel.blogspot.com. This is my christmas card that I am sending to
clients, friends and family this year. it features Santa Claus as a
happy man revelling in his time spent underneath the mistletoe. Internet
surfers around the world may be familiar with Christmas and Santa Claus
but maybe not so much mistletoe.
Mistletoe
is commonly used as a Christmas decoration, and according to custom,
the mistletoe must not touch the ground between its cutting and its
removal as the last of Christmas greens at the winter equinox; it may
remain hanging through the year, often to preserve the house from
lightning or fire, until it was replaced the following Christmas Eve. In cultures across pre-Christian Europe, mistletoe was seen as a representation of divine male essence. Whoohoo!
It was described in 1820 by American author Washington Irving in his "The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon": "The
mistletoe is still hung up in farm-houses and kitchens at Christmas,
and the young men have the privilege of kissing the girls under it,
plucking each time a berry from the bush. When the berries are all
plucked the privilege ceases."
I think these days it would be prudent to ask first.