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You Didn't Miss Mabon: The Harvest Is Still Happening

by Mambo Samantha Corfield

If you looked at the calendar, realized the Autumn Equinox has already passed, and thought, “Well, I missed Mabon,” I have good news for you. No, you didn’t. While many people celebrate Mabon on or very near the Autumn Equinox, in some circles the celebration extends from September 21 through September 29. And really, when you think about what Mabon represents, that makes perfect sense.

The harvest was never a one-day event. Our ancestors did not walk outside on the morning of the equinox, harvest everything before dinner, have a feast, and call it done.  Harvesting is work! Harvesting took time. Crops ripened at different rates. Food had to be gathered, preserved, stored, shared, and prepared for the months ahead. The harvest was a process, and our celebration of it can be a process, too.

Mabon is often called the second harvest on the Wheel of the Year. It is a time of gratitude, balance, abundance, and recognizing what has come to fruition in our lives. It is also a time to begin thinking about what we will carry with us into the darker months ahead. There are plenty of lovely traditional ways to celebrate. You can light candles, decorate your altar with apples, grains, leaves, squash, grapes, and other symbols of the season. You can prepare a harvest meal, take a walk outside and notice the changing Earth, write down what you are grateful for, or think about what you have metaphorically harvested from the seeds you planted earlier in the year. We have talked about many of those things before.

So this year, I would like to suggest something else we can do. Share the harvest.

One of the most beautiful ideas contained within any harvest celebration is abundance, but abundance becomes even more meaningful when some of what we have gathered is passed along to someone else. You do not need to have a lot of money to do this. You do not have to organize a fundraiser or fill the back of your car with groceries. If you can take two cans of soup from your pantry and put them into a food-bank donation box, you have shared the harvest. If you are grocery shopping this week, perhaps buy one extra item specifically for someone else. Peanut butter, canned vegetables, pasta, baby food, rice, beans, or whatever a food pantry in your area needs.

Many communities now have little free pantries or community refrigerators where people can leave food for anyone who needs it. Imagine making that your Mabon ritual. Instead of placing an apple on an altar as an offering, you might place food into a community pantry as an offering to another human being. That is sacred work, too. And you can still put an apple on your own altar and enjoy that apple  yourself.  This is about sharing, not necessarily about sacrificing.

If you have a little more to give, you could contact your local school district and ask whether there is a way to help with student meal accounts, unpaid lunch balances, or another program that provides food to children. Policies vary from district to district, but there is almost always a place where help can be put to good use. You could donate grocery gift cards to a shelter or contribute to a weekend backpack program that sends food home with children who might otherwise go hungry when school is closed.

If money is not what you have to give, perhaps time is. Volunteer for a few hours at a food bank, soup kitchen, homeless shelter, senior center, community garden, church pantry, or food rescue organization. Some organizations need people to sort donations, stock shelves, pack boxes, prepare meals, pick up surplus food, or deliver groceries to people who cannot easily leave their homes. There are even organizations that practice gleaning, gathering usable produce that would otherwise be left behind in fields or orchards and getting it to people who can use it. What could possibly represent the spirit of harvest more beautifully than making sure good food does not go to waste?

Or make it very personal. Cook dinner for an elderly neighbor. Bring groceries to someone going through a difficult time. Make soup for a friend who has been sick. Drop off a meal for a family with a new baby. Bake bread and share half of it. Invite someone to your table. There is something wonderfully old and human about that.

If you have children, Mabon can also become an opportunity to teach them that gratitude is not only saying, “Thank you for what I have.” Gratitude can also mean asking, “Because I have something, what can I share?” Let them choose a few foods at the grocery store for a donation box. Let them help deliver them. Explain why you are doing it. The lesson is not that we should feel guilty because we have enough. The lesson is that the harvest is for everyone.

Perhaps that is one of the most important things we can remember about abundance. Having something does not become less meaningful because we share it. Quite often, sharing it is what gives it meaning.

So if September 22 came and went and you did not light a candle, prepare a special dinner, decorate an altar, or do anything remotely Mabon-ish, please do not cross it off your calendar and think you failed. The harvest is still happening. Go buy two cans of soup. Put some pasta in a community pantry. Feed somebody. Help somebody. Share something. Then come home, light your candle if you want to, pour yourself something warm, and give thanks for whatever your own harvest has brought you this year.

That sounds like a beautiful Mabon celebration to me.

And there is still time.