Year after year, many of us continue to perform holiday rituals with little or no understanding of what they mean or what purpose they serve. A part of us yearns to understand how and why these special days originated.Why does Groundhog Day exist and what does it have to do with the Virgin Mary and menstruation? What does May Day have to do with a celebration of human sexuality and Roman prostitutes? Where did Valentine's Day come from — did the greeting card, chocolate, and florist companies create it, or is there something original, pure, and maybe even carnal about it?Fertility Goddesses, Groundhog Bellies & the Coca-Cola Company uncovers why humans have a need to mark certain days of the year and how much more meaning these celebrations could provide to our everyday lives if we only understood what purposes they served and continue to serve.Fertility Goddesses, Groundhog Bellies & the Coca-Cola Company digs through mythology, history, politics, and psychology to discover the elusive origins and meanings of many of our modern-day holidays. It connects the holidays to the cycles of nature and the human psyche and reveals how they have been changed and manipulated over time to serve certain religious, political, and commercial causes.

Gabriella Kalapos has been an environmental writer, organizer, and teacher for the last fifteen years. She lives in Toronto, Ontario.

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