Sunday, Dec 31, Center opens at 7:30pm

New Year’s Eve at Windhorse 2018-2019
These ceremonies and celebrations are a great way to end one year and begin the next. Here’s what happens at Windhorse (weather permitting):

On Monday, Dec. 31, the Center opens at 7:30pm.  Tea is available as people congregate, with a fire in the hearth if it’s cold enough outside. Formal zazen begins at 8:00, followed by all the ceremonies—quiet and noisy—that will help us enter 2019 feeling renewed, with cleansed and open minds and hearts. We finish with a candlelit circle, everyone reading a few lines of the New Year’s Prayer, together beaming out many wishes for peace and happiness for all on the planet.

Afterward, we’ll have the festive New Year’s Morning Potluck Brunch.  Just bring your favorite brunch dish, and enjoy an entire feast! Please also bring, for the ceremonies, a (non-earsplitting) noisemaker, and a sweet- sounding bell if you have one for the bell-ringing ceremony.  Robes, of course, are optional. It’s fine, in fact, to wear festive clothing for this event.

Those of you who’ve never participated in a Windhorse New Year’s Eve may imagine the schedule below to be daunting. Rest assured, it is a beautiful evening, rich with significance, and it all moves along with surprising speed. The schedule, by the way, is approximate; it depends on how long Circle takes, etc. This is just our best guess.

And finally–if you intend to come, we’d love to hear from you beforehand if possible, to smooth our planning process. Let us know if you’d like to stay over, too, to avoid driving that night after we finish. A number of people will be coming from out of town and will be staying over, and we can always make room for more.

Join us if you can for the Great Turning!