Boxing Day

Christmas has come and gone, and we are moving on to the new year. I hope your celebration was everything you wanted. Boxing Day is an interesting day. When I was young and in my teens, Boxing day was a day that was a time for visiting relatives or friends that we did not see on Christmas Day. My parents would dress up and we would go off for an afternoon of visiting. In our case, we went to my parent's friends in town and my parents would spend the day drinking and talking with their friends while the children would be forced to hang out with kids we never hang out with normally. 

My wife and her family experience a similar but different experience each Boxing Day. For them, Boxing Day was a day to visit with cousins and relatives who had not made it to their big Christmas Day celebrations. 

As newly married couples do, we sought to find a way to deal with both families around Christmas. What I realized looking back is that we came from two different cultures around Christmas and Boxing Day. I found it hard, not in a bad way, to get used to my the culture my wife and her family held dear at Christmas.  

My family celebrated Christmas in a small way, with a small (a maximum of 5 people) family dinner. My wife's family held a large Christmas feast, with never less than 30 people, all relatives in attendance. Boxing Day was a time to visit all of the other relatives who could not make Christmas, and this was achieved by having a great aunt or cousin hold a potluck drop in the afternoon (which lasted until late evening). 

New Year's Day, was another round of visiting after a big family party, which was always held at my wife's parents' house. New Year's day was a time for visiting all the relatives again.  It was a hectic time and it became our culture when our kids were young.

Over time as people became older, the traditions started to fade. People died, became ill, could not travel, the reasons were real and over time we lost the tradition of the big family gathering at Christmas. I miss it. 

Boxing Day is now an opportunity to line up at the stores for the biggest sale of the year. The day is not the same. Do you have any family traditions that have changed over the years?

Merry Xmas

From my family to you and yours, may this day be filled with love and grace, family and friends.

December is a very interesting month, many multicultural events and celebrations happen in Dec.  I missed wishing those of the Jewish faith Happy Hanukkah, and my Japanese friends Happy Omisoka, my Swedish friends Happy St. Lucia Day and my African American friends Happy Kwanzaa and finally to my pagan friends Happy Saturnalia.

Below is a list of some of the celebrations held in December.

Saint Nicholas Day (Christian)
Fiesta of Our Lady of Guadalupe (Mexican)
St. Lucia Day (Swedish)
Hanukkah (Jewish)
Christmas Day (Christian)
Three Kings Day/Epiphany (Christian)
Boxing Day (Australian, Canadian, English, Irish)
Kwanzaa (African American)
Omisoka (Japanese)
Yule (Pagan)
Saturnalia (Pagan)

Your fan club

Life can be difficult, we each wage battles to survive and to prosper,  would it make any difference if you knew that there are people who understand deeply, the battles you've waged? 

They know and have approved of the choices you've made. Each of us has our own fan club, the members of your fan club will be gathering with you tomorrow if they can. They will be celebrating the passage of another year in your life. The will be celebrating what you have taught them and the difference you have made in their life. 

They celebrate you just as you celebrate them. At one point, people got together tomorrow to celebrate a birth, but not as many of us are religious anymore. However, we still get together to celebrate, and we celebrate each other and the difference we make in each other's life. Well, believe it or not, you make a difference and have meaning for many people, celebrate the day with them and enjoy their company. You never know what tomorrow will bring.

Marijuana and Parkinson Disease

Marijuana is legal in Canada and some of you may be giving or getting some for the holidays. The following is from a story by Marie Ellis, published in Medical News Today in 2016.

Interestingly  Marijuana helps people who are suffering from Parkinsons Disease. In a review published in the journal Parkinson's Disease led by Prof. Zvi Loewy, from the Touro College of Pharmacy in New York, NY, his findings suggest symptoms of the condition could be improved with marijuana.  

Parkinson's disease is the second most common neurological illness in the United States, causing tremors, slowness of movement, postural instability, and impaired balance and coordination.  in the U.S., Parkinson's disease (PD) affects about 1 million people. It is progressive, which means it gets worse over time, and it occurs when a person's brain stops producing dopamine.

Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that plays a key role in our movements as well as in cognitive and psychological functions.

There is currently no cure for the disease; treatments carry with them several limitations and do not slow the progression of PD. Professor Loewy and his team conducted a thorough literature review on studies of marijuana. The most compelling finding was that chemical components of marijuana yield benefits in the wake of different PD symptoms.

For example, Prof. Loewy notes that marijuana has been found to relieve pain in other diseases, adding that it should be studied for pain relief in people with PD. Pain affects nearly 50 percent of people with the condition, the researchers note.

But why is marijuana specifically promising for PD? According to the team, the cannabinoid compounds in marijuana bind to dopamine receptors to reduce the effects of reduced dopamine in the brain.


Essentially, the compounds replace the normal compounds that are adversely affected by Parkinson's. The big finding from their review centers around the anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects of marijuana, which may prevent neuron damage.

Inflammation can damage neurons that produce dopamine - the lack of which contributes to movement problems in Parkinson's. So preventing neuron damage could slow PD progression.

There is a need for safer drugs to treat PD, adding that cannabis may provide a viable alternative or addition to the current treatment of Parkinson's disease.

There are risks to take into account, recent research has uncovered some downsides to marijuana use, including memory loss, increased osteoporosis risk, and impaired blood vessel function.

Furthermore, a study published in 2016 suggested marijuana use may reduce dopamine in the brain.


Given all of this, they concluded that further studies are needed to provide more data on efficacy, safety, pharmacokinetics, and interactions of cannabinoids.