#laci green

lacigreen:

Christmas is such a weird time of year to me.  It’s the holiday that most people in my life celebrate.  When I was younger, I found it weird because it was a religious holiday for my family and i don’t believe in god.  Then i dug a little deeper and found a secular meaning in it, as a time to give back to the community and help each other.  Cosy nights where people come together while it’s cold outside to reconnect with each other and laugh a lot and celebrate various traditions.  Snow on trees, being in the mountains even though it’s cold as fuck, snow hiking, hot tea being nice to drink again. That’s the celebration i try to hold on to, but it is hard because most people in my life have a more traditional take on it.  Which is fine but some aspects are troubling.

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For one thing, i find gift giving genuinely stressful.  Sometimes a gift exchange feels truly sweet, particularly when a lover or friend or fam put thought/time/soul into it and it’s something you will cherish or something you really needed that will make your life easier.  I also enjoy gift giving when i think of something i can make that i know they will love, but that’s hard for me to do organically every year and it just feels like a lot of pressure!  It’s also true that there are people in my life who communicate their love through gifts.  That’s how they receive love and not getting a gift, even if it’s something small, would feel slightly hurtful.  different love languages. 

I’m also kind of uncomfortable with the concept of excess and buying things just to buy them, especially when there are people struggling to survive.  I think the consumerism comes from the unavoidable media messaging around christmas moreso than actual behaviors of the people in my life, but it’s still moderately annoying.

I also somewhat resent that society seems to have a higher-than-usual expectations of joy, holiday spirit, happiness, smiles.  It makes me feel like i have to fake it.  It’s easy to do at stores or in passing interactions, but is much harder when it comes to my family.  I grew up mormon, and one of the things that i noticed was fairly common at my church was families putting on facades to make everything seem perfect and without problems.  Everyone gets along, there is never any hurt or fighting or pain - smile through the pain!  Even though most my family has since left the mormon church, I feel like this has been an influential expectation on how we deal with our problems.  I also have depression, and when it creeps up on me it usually stays a few months, however unwelcome.  Depression has a funny way of snatching the joy and purpose from things I usually enjoy (like holiday parties!) and makes socializing especially exhausting.  Basically a fuckton of energy to get through the holidays.

As a nice cherry on the holiday sundae, the world is fucked up.  And no that’s not different this year, the world has always been fucked up, but as a sentient creature, the internet is constantly making me aware of all of the ways that the world is fucked up.  And it just feels like a lot to handle when I am trying to find a reason to get out of bed every day.  Slaughter in aleppo and the phillipines, Trump & a cabinet of shamelessly prejudiced sociopath billionaires who want to destroy our precious planet, brexit.  Mass murders, unacknowledged police brutality, a president who is a sexual predator, who talks like the man who assaulted me when i was 19.  I listen to NPR every morning hoping to hear some good news.  Sometimes they do, alongside helpful explanations of things that are going on (which is why i’m donating to them this year), but most of the news is especially bad right now.  

To balance it out and not send my mental health into a black hole, I deliberately seek out good news and fun stuff online to boost my mood but it can only do so much.  I have found myself on tumblr more often because there’s a undercurrent of empathy on this site that seems to be lacking elsewhere (yt, facebook, twitter) in my current online experience.  I am spending more time with friends that make me laugh and feel loved.  I’m kickboxing with a new friend from the internet, which has been super fun.  As for christmas, my and my babe are going to spend a few days in the mountains.  Having things to look forward to helps a lot.  Coping is survival.

Anyway.  I guess the moral of this way too long rant is that if you feel similarly shitty during the holidays because of the world or mental health or family problems or money concerns – it’s ok.  And it’s ok to approach them as a healing time for yourself, whatever that may mean for you.

thanks for listening.  love & light my fellow fighters.  

x laci

Here’s a compilation of videos from influencers on YouTube who are speaking up about the presidential elections in the United States and its effects.

PART 1

SourceFed:

Harley Morenstein:

Craig Benzine (a.k.a Wheezy Waiter):

Laci Green:

Philip DeFranco:

PART 2