PunchySunshine
Well-known member
It's the only zoom call I look forward too tbh
PSA: The Holiday Blues
- Thread starter BuddytheReow
- Start date
swelchy
Well-known member
Nailed it... We all "Fine" until we are not... I agree people who arent feeling good about themselves or their situation need to reach out to someone/anyone..
gtfields13
Well-known member
@BuddytheReow Nicely said, and kudos for stepping up and starting this.
There's a lot of pressure on many of us - and self-care is super important but also easy to de-prioritize under the crush of everything else that's urgent. It's really why I decided to step into this community in the last year. I realized that I needed to do something more than pull the train for my family. Something that is satisfying and guilt- and stress-free.
Maybe some of you have noticed that there is always a sticker on the inside of the lid of my pedals - it's a sticker you can typically find at a therapist or counselors office. Just an inside reminder to anyone to mind their mental health.
There's a lot of pressure on many of us - and self-care is super important but also easy to de-prioritize under the crush of everything else that's urgent. It's really why I decided to step into this community in the last year. I realized that I needed to do something more than pull the train for my family. Something that is satisfying and guilt- and stress-free.
Maybe some of you have noticed that there is always a sticker on the inside of the lid of my pedals - it's a sticker you can typically find at a therapist or counselors office. Just an inside reminder to anyone to mind their mental health.
My brother is a strange guy... Five years older than me, we recently worked out that we both think he's on the spectrum somewhere. He's a computer guy - I don't really know what he does because it's beyond my comprehension but he's very good at it. People he's not so good at. We were never close growing up. He was always reading, always had his nose in a book and always had a very short fuse. As we got older I worked out that he was extremely easy to wind up, so that's what I did. But over the years we worked out that corresponding via email was the way to do it - we get on very well via email. He lives 3500km away anyway so in person visits are rare - and still fraught. He's the size of the average family saloon and has diabetes.
Nowadays he lives on his own. Every christmas he goes to the zoo to avoid all the christmas crap. He's a keen amateur photographer and loves shooting animals - with a camera. He actually seems quite happy. He loves his job and works long hours doing complicated computer stuff. My wife and I both keep in touch and he really seems to like the interaction. My wife is really lovely and writes to him just as much as I do. When he's feeling crap he'll email us and we can usually work it out somehow. He'll send over a pic he's taken asking for advice on cropping or treatment or something so I'll send him back some suggestions, even photoshopping ideas with his pics for him, as I have years of experience as a professional photographer.
So I'll be emailing him again shortly as christmas gets closer, and I'm sure my wife will too. It's really good that after all these years we can actually appreciate each other's company by avoiding the ways we annoy each other! Usually I think email is a pretty shitty way to communicate, but with someone like my brother it works very well.
Nowadays he lives on his own. Every christmas he goes to the zoo to avoid all the christmas crap. He's a keen amateur photographer and loves shooting animals - with a camera. He actually seems quite happy. He loves his job and works long hours doing complicated computer stuff. My wife and I both keep in touch and he really seems to like the interaction. My wife is really lovely and writes to him just as much as I do. When he's feeling crap he'll email us and we can usually work it out somehow. He'll send over a pic he's taken asking for advice on cropping or treatment or something so I'll send him back some suggestions, even photoshopping ideas with his pics for him, as I have years of experience as a professional photographer.
So I'll be emailing him again shortly as christmas gets closer, and I'm sure my wife will too. It's really good that after all these years we can actually appreciate each other's company by avoiding the ways we annoy each other! Usually I think email is a pretty shitty way to communicate, but with someone like my brother it works very well.
CheapSuitG
The TubeSchemer
Glad you found a way to communicate with him, we all work differently so being flexible is key sometimes.
jessenator
Well-known member
yo
bean
Legume Liaison
Not sure on the 28th now. Moms is supposed to come for Xmas week but she's under the weather so I may go visit her instead. We'll do it in the next couple weeks one way or another.
KR Sound
Well-known member
These last few months have sucked. Dad’s cancer has gotten the best of him and has caused stroke-like symptoms. Between a couple weeks in the hospital and a couple in rehab, we’ve decided that home hospice is the best route moving forward. He’s not the same Dad I’ve known for over 50 years and it sucks. It sucks. I’ve been travelling for work 2 hours away to the south 3-4 days a week, and spending the other 3 days 2 hours to the north with him and his wife and cousins that live nearby. Could be weeks, months, days. Who knows.
Life has a way of making us feel like there’s always more time- more holidays, more weekends, more “next times.” But the reality is quieter and more urgent than that.
The people we love are always changing, and so are we. Your parents are getting older, whether you notice it day by day or not. Your children are growing up in ways you’ll only recognize in hindsight. Your friends are building lives that might take them in different directions. Even you- you’re becoming someone slightly different with each passing year, with different priorities, different availability, different capacity for connection.
There’s no dramatic music that plays to warn you when you’re having the last spontaneous dinner with someone, or the last time your kid will grab your hand without thinking about it, or the final inside joke with a friend before life pulls you apart. These moments slip by unmarked, and you only recognize them in the rearview mirror.
What makes this especially poignant is that we often sacrifice presence for productivity. We tell ourselves we’re building a better future, working longer hours, pursuing goals, staying busy, and we are, in a sense. But sometimes we’re so focused on building tomorrow that we forget to inhabit today. The irony is the future we’re building often matters far less than the present we’re trading away for it.
Time with people you love isn’t just pleasant, it’s the substance of life itself. Years from now, you won’t remember most of what kept you busy. You won’t care about the emails you answered or the pedals you built. But you’ll remember the conversations, the laughter, the quiet moments of just being together. And if those moments are scarce, their absence will ache.
This isn’t about living in fear or morbidity. It’s about recognition. The people in your life right now, as they are right now, won’t be here in this exact form forever. So call them. Visit them.
Put down your phone when you’re with them.
Ask them questions. Listen to their stories again, even the ones you’ve heard before. Let them be more important than your to-do list, because one day, without warning, they will be only memory.
And you’ll wish you had one more afternoon.
Life has a way of making us feel like there’s always more time- more holidays, more weekends, more “next times.” But the reality is quieter and more urgent than that.
The people we love are always changing, and so are we. Your parents are getting older, whether you notice it day by day or not. Your children are growing up in ways you’ll only recognize in hindsight. Your friends are building lives that might take them in different directions. Even you- you’re becoming someone slightly different with each passing year, with different priorities, different availability, different capacity for connection.
There’s no dramatic music that plays to warn you when you’re having the last spontaneous dinner with someone, or the last time your kid will grab your hand without thinking about it, or the final inside joke with a friend before life pulls you apart. These moments slip by unmarked, and you only recognize them in the rearview mirror.
What makes this especially poignant is that we often sacrifice presence for productivity. We tell ourselves we’re building a better future, working longer hours, pursuing goals, staying busy, and we are, in a sense. But sometimes we’re so focused on building tomorrow that we forget to inhabit today. The irony is the future we’re building often matters far less than the present we’re trading away for it.
Time with people you love isn’t just pleasant, it’s the substance of life itself. Years from now, you won’t remember most of what kept you busy. You won’t care about the emails you answered or the pedals you built. But you’ll remember the conversations, the laughter, the quiet moments of just being together. And if those moments are scarce, their absence will ache.
This isn’t about living in fear or morbidity. It’s about recognition. The people in your life right now, as they are right now, won’t be here in this exact form forever. So call them. Visit them.
Put down your phone when you’re with them.
Ask them questions. Listen to their stories again, even the ones you’ve heard before. Let them be more important than your to-do list, because one day, without warning, they will be only memory.
And you’ll wish you had one more afternoon.
giovanni
Well-known member
This has been on my mind recently. My parents are currently visiting from Italy and our relationship has always been a bit fraught. And I have been thinking about the fact that they don’t have many more years left on this earth and I am not sure what to do to make our relationship a bit better. I guess that’s just to say that all you said resonates with me @KR Sound.
EisengesisFX
Well-known member
Appreciate this thread and all sentiments shared within it. A lot of good reminders for the care of oneself and those we hold close.
I'm still no closer to a new job, let alone an interview, but I got the unemployment bennies + what I got from severance and selling a big chunk of (not essential/actively used) gear and records at the onset of the layoff in mid-August and I'm doing OK. There's definitely a hiring freeze between mid-November and -January so I'm just trying to frame it as something of a winter break. Meanwhile, the annual HOA meeting was last night and due to sub-majority attendance, the NINETEEN percent hike in dues was automatically ratified. Never rains, only pours.
I also am a very much a sobriety proponent because among other detriments, I cannot imagine what my cannabis addiction would be costing me financially at this point since it was like $150 a week at minimum BEFORE the pandemic, inflation, etc etc. Weed feels like an embarrassing thing to mention as an addiction given what opioid/coke/alcohol addicts deal with but like, I put myself in psychosis eating sketchy hash dabs in 2020. Really glad I'm not in that place anymore.
Instead, my hyperfixative personality is consumed with pedal building and my home lifting regimen, and I'm mad grateful to be in this community. It's only the best parts of the message board cultures I remember from ~20 years ago and it's not a million people involved. Season's greetings and salutations to y'all from Seattle
I'm still no closer to a new job, let alone an interview, but I got the unemployment bennies + what I got from severance and selling a big chunk of (not essential/actively used) gear and records at the onset of the layoff in mid-August and I'm doing OK. There's definitely a hiring freeze between mid-November and -January so I'm just trying to frame it as something of a winter break. Meanwhile, the annual HOA meeting was last night and due to sub-majority attendance, the NINETEEN percent hike in dues was automatically ratified. Never rains, only pours.
I also am a very much a sobriety proponent because among other detriments, I cannot imagine what my cannabis addiction would be costing me financially at this point since it was like $150 a week at minimum BEFORE the pandemic, inflation, etc etc. Weed feels like an embarrassing thing to mention as an addiction given what opioid/coke/alcohol addicts deal with but like, I put myself in psychosis eating sketchy hash dabs in 2020. Really glad I'm not in that place anymore.
Instead, my hyperfixative personality is consumed with pedal building and my home lifting regimen, and I'm mad grateful to be in this community. It's only the best parts of the message board cultures I remember from ~20 years ago and it's not a million people involved. Season's greetings and salutations to y'all from Seattle
Guardians of the analog
Papi Fuego
This year has brought out the worst in everyone in my life this holiday season
tegendemuur
Well-known member
Thanks for the slivers of humanity, strangers. Not a lot to add. I quit drinking 4,5 years ago. I started one of those Reddit excel life logs; visualizing the hangover days did the trick for me. Being sober helped me a lot in defining my current interests, as there's no "lost days" to kill my rhythm.
I talk about death a lot. Always did, jokingly. But with ageing parents, that attitude couldn't be held up. My parents and I openly discuss it all. My brother on the other hand tells my 70-year-old mom to paint the walls herself, instead of helping. He's totally denying to wide open fact that mom and dad are slowly falling apart. It's my biggest frustration nowadays. He's very hostile about defending his ignorance. I can only hope he gets crushed when the inevitable happens.
Since Trump is back in office I have actively ignored all the news in the world. No bookmarks. I turn off the radio at work whenever I can. As expected, this made me a happier person. Almost all that the news media pushes is beyond my reach of influence, so I take it as of no value to me. It is draining. And that what it saps from me, I cannot give to the world that's right around me. I want to be able to honestly smile to those I have to deal with in real life.
As is the case with many, my fuse has shortened since the pandemic. I can't deal with crowds anymore. I can't stand humans as a species, while caring plenty about individuals. Even strangers can brighten my day.
Think of Christmas as the celebration of how it came to be, pre-Jesus. Celebrate togetherness, because not everyone will survive the looming winter. Nature doesn't care about us. About if you're good or bad. And instead of winter, it is cancer and other devouring diseases who reap whoever is in its way.
Be there this year. The next one isn't a given. Even you may fall.
I talk about death a lot. Always did, jokingly. But with ageing parents, that attitude couldn't be held up. My parents and I openly discuss it all. My brother on the other hand tells my 70-year-old mom to paint the walls herself, instead of helping. He's totally denying to wide open fact that mom and dad are slowly falling apart. It's my biggest frustration nowadays. He's very hostile about defending his ignorance. I can only hope he gets crushed when the inevitable happens.
Since Trump is back in office I have actively ignored all the news in the world. No bookmarks. I turn off the radio at work whenever I can. As expected, this made me a happier person. Almost all that the news media pushes is beyond my reach of influence, so I take it as of no value to me. It is draining. And that what it saps from me, I cannot give to the world that's right around me. I want to be able to honestly smile to those I have to deal with in real life.
As is the case with many, my fuse has shortened since the pandemic. I can't deal with crowds anymore. I can't stand humans as a species, while caring plenty about individuals. Even strangers can brighten my day.
Think of Christmas as the celebration of how it came to be, pre-Jesus. Celebrate togetherness, because not everyone will survive the looming winter. Nature doesn't care about us. About if you're good or bad. And instead of winter, it is cancer and other devouring diseases who reap whoever is in its way.
Be there this year. The next one isn't a given. Even you may fall.
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andare
Well-known member
We went to see Mom today. Her ashes are close to her parents'. I don't like cemeteries, I prefer to remember people when they were alive, but my sister wanted to wish her Merry Christmas since starting from this year, Mom won't be at home with us.
On Monday one of my best friends went into rehab for 4 weeks. Drinking problem. She'll be out in time to see her son return from a semester in Canada. Hopefully she does well in there.
On the upside, I just finished cooking a veal roast and Bolognese sauce for tomorrow, I'm making lasagne. I got a cold one in the fridge because I know alcohol sucks but I'm lucky in that I can limit myself and I enjoy the taste and fuck it, it helps.
The songs ain't coming, my guitar technique ain't improving but I'm lucky I can play a few instruments and entertain myself and people sometimes. Hopefully I'll record and release music in 2026.
Take care of yourself, everyone!
I'll leave you with one of the squirrels that live in our garden, chomping on some food and relieving himself like a boss. That's gotta feel good:
On Monday one of my best friends went into rehab for 4 weeks. Drinking problem. She'll be out in time to see her son return from a semester in Canada. Hopefully she does well in there.
On the upside, I just finished cooking a veal roast and Bolognese sauce for tomorrow, I'm making lasagne. I got a cold one in the fridge because I know alcohol sucks but I'm lucky in that I can limit myself and I enjoy the taste and fuck it, it helps.
The songs ain't coming, my guitar technique ain't improving but I'm lucky I can play a few instruments and entertain myself and people sometimes. Hopefully I'll record and release music in 2026.
Take care of yourself, everyone!
I'll leave you with one of the squirrels that live in our garden, chomping on some food and relieving himself like a boss. That's gotta feel good:
darwin999
Well-known member
With all the absolutely dreadful crap out there this year, I plan to focus on simple pleasures.
I'll count what blessings I have, including the ones I previously took for granted.
E.g., I'm not in the Ukraine, Gaza, or the many other awful places where war rages.
And I'm not a desperate immigrant being thrown onto a plane, and shipped penniless to a country that I've never lived in.
To those that are, I feel pretty powerless right now and can only offer my sincere and humble best wishes.
I plan to enjoy what I can, when I can.
Time, life, friends and nature are all precious.
Happy holidays, folks.
I'll count what blessings I have, including the ones I previously took for granted.
E.g., I'm not in the Ukraine, Gaza, or the many other awful places where war rages.
And I'm not a desperate immigrant being thrown onto a plane, and shipped penniless to a country that I've never lived in.
To those that are, I feel pretty powerless right now and can only offer my sincere and humble best wishes.
I plan to enjoy what I can, when I can.
Time, life, friends and nature are all precious.
Happy holidays, folks.
I think I made my brother's christmas day for him! He lives by himself a long way away. I managed to lock myself out of my Mac laptop - I can never remember passwords and had restarted my Mac because it was misbehaving - which is unusual. So I texted him and spent at least 20 minutes following his directions and managed to get back into my computer. For someone so bad at people he is surprisingly good at explaining things in a logical and easy to follow way. He would actually be an excellent teacher in computing. As soon as I told him my problem I could hear his pleasure at having something to solve in his texts!
It reminded me of when my son was about eight years old and I had unloaded some IKEA boxes for my wife's office furniture. My boy came home from school, saw the boxes and said "Looks like us men have to building to do!" And he rubbed his hands together like an old man warming up to get to work. Moments like these you want to bottle.
It reminded me of when my son was about eight years old and I had unloaded some IKEA boxes for my wife's office furniture. My boy came home from school, saw the boxes and said "Looks like us men have to building to do!" And he rubbed his hands together like an old man warming up to get to work. Moments like these you want to bottle.
Feral Feline
Well-known member
@KR Sound
The key word in your post was "poignant".
Sorry to hear about your father. Lost mine on 2 Jan 2018. He remains one of the finest examples of human decency I've ever known. Big shoes to fill, impossible to fill.
Brother managed to "man up", to use his own phrase, during this year's this holler-day and actually helped, he lifted a finger — then lifted the pancakes my wife made for my mom and my mom said nothing to him. She's afraid if she says anything he won't visit at all. He barely visits her as it is.
When mom's gone, he'll be alone.
Happy Boxing Day and belated b b b blue Chirstmeis, everyone.
Let's all have a great 2026, just to spite the Universe!
The key word in your post was "poignant".
Sorry to hear about your father. Lost mine on 2 Jan 2018. He remains one of the finest examples of human decency I've ever known. Big shoes to fill, impossible to fill.
Brother managed to "man up", to use his own phrase, during this year's this holler-day and actually helped, he lifted a finger — then lifted the pancakes my wife made for my mom and my mom said nothing to him. She's afraid if she says anything he won't visit at all. He barely visits her as it is.
When mom's gone, he'll be alone.
Happy Boxing Day and belated b b b blue Chirstmeis, everyone.
Let's all have a great 2026, just to spite the Universe!
KR Sound
Well-known member
Thanks, friend. I’m glad you saw that because I actually spent a few minutes thinking about what word to use there, and it seemed like the most appropriate.
Sorry about your dad, and ours sound very much alike!