{"id":9018,"date":"2013-10-01T01:10:31","date_gmt":"2013-10-01T06:10:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paganpages.org\/content\/?p=9328"},"modified":"2013-09-28T13:32:08","modified_gmt":"2013-09-28T18:32:08","slug":"the-neon-pagan-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/2013\/10\/01\/the-neon-pagan-4\/","title":{"rendered":"The Neon Pagan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mum\u2019s the Word<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

If it\u2019s October, it\u2019s time for me to prepare to be a mummer. Actually, I\u2019ve been paying towards being a mummer since June. Rehearsals start in November. Final payment on my costume (we call them \u201csuits\u201d) is due at that time.<\/p>\n

I live near Philadelphia, and one of Philly\u2019s grand traditions is its New Years Day Mummers\u2019 Parade. In this lengthy, lively, and colorful affair, \u201cmummers\u201d of many stripes entertain the hung-over citizenry of the City of Brotherly Love.<\/p>\n

There are several divisions of mummers, depending upon talent, tenacity, and sobriety. At the top of the heap in all three categories stand the string bands, whose elaborate routines and off-the-charts costumes leave you wondering: How can these people be amateurs?<\/em> At the other end of the spectrum, especially in regards to sobriety, are the comic clubs. They are clearly peopled by amateurs on limited budgets who just want to have a semi-organized good ol\u2019 time.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m in a comic club. It\u2019s officially called a New Year\u2019s Brigade. We march between 150 and 175 members every year. In 2012 we got first place for our routine \u201cWenchtoberfest.\u201d Oh yeah, I forgot to mention. In comic brigades, everyone wears dresses. With ruffles. And bloomers. There\u2019s nothing quite so funny as a fat man twerking in a German barmaid costume and a blonde wig.<\/p>\n

It turns out that \u201cmumming\u201d is an ancient tradition. (That shouldn\u2019t be surprising. Everything that\u2019s fun is basically an ancient tradition.) In the British Isles, mummers greet the New Year by wearing costumes and prowling from house to house, or having parades. There are two operative words here: \u201cmum,\u201d and \u201ccostume.\u201d<\/p>\n

Almost every place that holds a mummers\u2019 parade will say that the event got started because civic leaders wanted to put a curb on holiday drinking. But why the parade? Why the costumes? This<\/em> is where the whole ancient tradition thing comes in. There\u2019s nothing new under the sun. Greeting a new year by wearing strange clothing and acting out without speaking goes way, way back into the mists of time. The only thing that\u2019s gotten funky is the date.<\/p>\n

The Philly Mummers\u2019 Parade is held on January 1. This coincides with mummer traditions in the United Kingdom, particularly Scotland. But my home town, Hagerstown, Maryland, also had a Mummers\u2019 Parade. It was held on Halloween.<\/p>\n

Hagerstown\u2019s story is the same as Philly\u2019s: The town fathers, seeking to curb misbehavior, initiated a lavish costume parade on Halloween. If this seems extremely natural, well \u2026 it is. Halloween was the Celtic New Year. It doesn\u2019t take a leap of faith to feel that the ancient Celts must have brought in their New Year with costumes and hijinks and people acting out under the anonymity of speechlessness.<\/p>\n

When I march with my mummer brigade, I feel like I\u2019m immersed in the Old Ways. The New Year is upon us. Let\u2019s get suited up in the strangest way possible and act out in a somewhat organized manner. Call it trick-or-treating if you like, but don\u2019t buy the line that this is something new and modern. It is ancient and holy, and a whole lot of fun.<\/p>\n

Happy New Year!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mum\u2019s the Word   If it\u2019s October, it\u2019s time for me to prepare to be a mummer. Actually, I\u2019ve been paying towards being a mummer since June. Rehearsals start in November. Final payment on my costume (we call them \u201csuits\u201d) is due at that time. I live near Philadelphia, and one of Philly\u2019s grand traditions is its New Years Day Mummers\u2019 Parade. In this lengthy, lively, and colorful affair, \u201cmummers\u201d of many stripes entertain the hung-over citizenry of the City of Brotherly Love. There are several divisions of mummers, depending upon talent, tenacity, and sobriety. At the top of the heap in all three categories stand the string bands, whose elaborate routines and off-the-charts costumes leave you wondering: How can these people be amateurs? At the other end of the spectrum, especially in regards to sobriety, are the comic clubs. They are clearly peopled by amateurs on limited budgets who just want to have a semi-organized good ol\u2019 time. I\u2019m in a comic club. It\u2019s officially called a New Year\u2019s Brigade. We march between 150 and 175 members every year. In 2012 we got first place for our routine \u201cWenchtoberfest.\u201d Oh yeah, I forgot to mention. In comic brigades, everyone wears dresses. With ruffles. And bloomers. There\u2019s nothing quite so funny as a fat man twerking in a German barmaid costume and a blonde wig. It turns out that \u201cmumming\u201d is an ancient tradition. (That shouldn\u2019t be surprising. Everything that\u2019s fun is basically an ancient tradition.) In the British Isles, mummers greet the New Year by wearing costumes and prowling from house to house, or having parades. There are two operative words here: \u201cmum,\u201d and \u201ccostume.\u201d Almost every place that holds a mummers\u2019 parade will say that the event got started because civic leaders wanted to put a curb on holiday drinking. But why the parade? Why the costumes? This is where the whole ancient tradition thing comes in. There\u2019s nothing new under the sun. Greeting a new year by wearing strange clothing and acting out without speaking goes way, way back into the mists of time. The only thing that\u2019s gotten funky is the date. The Philly Mummers\u2019 Parade is held on January 1. This coincides with mummer traditions in the United Kingdom, particularly Scotland. But my home town, Hagerstown, Maryland, also had a Mummers\u2019 Parade. It was held on Halloween. Hagerstown\u2019s story is the same as Philly\u2019s: The town fathers, seeking to curb misbehavior, initiated a lavish costume parade on Halloween. If this seems extremely natural, well \u2026 it is. Halloween was the Celtic New Year. It doesn\u2019t take a leap of faith to feel that the ancient Celts must have brought in their New Year with costumes and hijinks and people acting out under the anonymity of speechlessness. When I march with my mummer brigade, I feel like I\u2019m immersed in the Old Ways. The New Year is upon us. Let\u2019s get suited up in the strangest way possible and act out in a somewhat organized manner. Call it trick-or-treating if you like, but don\u2019t buy the line that this is something new and modern. It is ancient and holy, and a whole lot of fun. Happy New Year!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":194,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9018","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9018","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/194"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9018"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9018\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8717,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9018\/revisions\/8717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}