The last months of each year sound like a hallmark movie – there’s a lot of colour everywhere, people are happier and generally nicer. It’s like how we feel about our hair, right before a cut. Festivals do that to us. My brother had said something that summed it up for me, “I’m always looking forward to coming back home, and just having fun, which makes me forget about issues that are still going to exist.” It’s like a temporary delusion.
Growing up, I could always see my parents do specific things around festivals that had become their ritual, as a family. I may or may not have adopted some of those things, but as a kid, I always felt like a part of them. However, growing up means that you feel more detached from home – growing up also feels a lot like growing out. It doesn’t even have to be about your parents, it just happens because that’s what maturing does.
When we lose something, we try hard to replace it. In this case, it comes down to replacing old rituals with new ones. However, we never talk about the constant pressure associated with celebrating something, anything. This particularly runs high when you’re expected to behave a certain way or just be happy, when you’re not. It’s like this: You could be feeling blue on normal days, and you can just be. But this changes on festivals, because you can’t go on and say it out loud. The conventionality of anything just adds on to the pressure.
The sadness associated with festivals is also very lonely. Imagine having to layer it with new rituals, setting, and even people, in some cases. With family, it’s assumed that we don’t have to do much. In other cases, we might just have to go the extra mile to make that effort. What’s worse is, when you have to do it all alone. Maybe, that’s why people come back home, even if they do end up finding one, someplace else.
The good thing about our generation is that we don’t attach ourselves to things that don’t make sense to us. We also don’t shy away from accepting or showing it. In doing so, we share a lot from our lives with the world – even if that means just putting a picture on Instagram. The not-so-good-part, however, is the impact of it. Today, there’s the concept of ‘new age’ attached to most things. Probably, traditions have also changed for good; but, it’s the missing out that hurts, here.
Just randomly scrolling the feed, and knowing that someone else is doing something that you’re not, hurts a little bit. It’s a lot about the fear of missing out; but it’s also about wanting a certain lifestyle because it looks good. That’s what the internet does. It gives us this delusion that everybody has a better life than we do, which may or may not be true. The impact, however, is saddening.
While these blues stem from different reasons, they very much exist. So, feeling out of place, not feeling good or just not wanting to celebrate is nothing ‘not normal’. It’s as human as feeling happy. The only thing that makes it weird is that it cannot be easily acknowledged.