Seasons, Part 3

     In the Celtic calendar, the next festival following Midwinter falls on February 1st.  It is called Imbolc, or Candlemas, the Feast of Lights.  It is the celebration of the beginning of spring, when the earliest spring flowers start to bloom, when the frozen creeks start to stir, and when the days begin to lengthen. 

     Imbolc also coincides with the feast day of St. Brigid.  In Scotland, girls would dress up a figure and then parade it around the village.  Afterward, they would take the figure of St. Brigid into a house where young men would come and pay homage to her.  Then there would be dancing and singing and at dawn there would be an invocation sung to the saint.

(photo courtesy of pixabay.com)