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The signification of the yuzuri-leaf I explained in a former paper. But the great domestic display of the festival is the decoration of the kamidana the shelf of the Gods. Before the household miya are placed great double rice cakes; and the shrine is beautiful with flowers, a tiny shimekazari, and sprays of sakaki.
The meaning is that each kadomatsu is a milestone on the journey to the Meido; or, in other words, that each New Year's festival signal only the completion of another stage of the ceaseless journey to death. 3 The difference between the shimenawa and shimekazari is that the latter is a strictly decorative straw rope, to which many curious emblems are attached.
Shimenawa or shimekazari the straw ropes which have been sacred symbols of Shinto from the mythical age are festooned along the faades of the dwellings, and so inter-joined that you see to right or left what seems but a single mile-long shimenawa, with its straw pendents and white fluttering paper gohei, extending along either side of the street as far as the eye can reach.
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