Cathartic Festivus!

I was going to say, “Happy Festivus!” but Festivus isn’t about happiness, is it? It’s about airing your mofo grievances and that’s something better than happy. It’s restorative and cleansing and yes, cathartic. Festivus is as important a holiday tradition to me as hiding my children’s Christmas gifts in places I won’t find them until Valentine’s Day and drunkenly wrapping gifts until the wee hours of Christmas morning beneath the glow of bad Netflix romcoms. Here’s what I shook my fist at last year, what I removed my hoop earrings to issue a beat down to the year before, the things on the receiving end of my spitting-during-angry-talking in 2019, and the original list of grievances from 2016.

So, without further ado, my grievances!

• The Barbara’s Multigrain Spoonfuls Conspiracy – Barb, I’m no cereal mogul but I believe the formula for success is two-part: 1) Make a delicious cereal, and 2) Make said cereal available to purchase at stores humans have access to. You really nailed #1, Babs, but wtf happened at stage 2? At this point, finding a box of MGS’s is like finding a pair of Air Force 1’s at Marshall’s. The only spoonfuls I have now are ones of disappoint, Barb.

• The patriarchy – no explanation needed. It needs more smashing.
• Rosie’s anxiety-induced incontinence – we take her on two long walks and one short one every day, we cuddle her, we praise her, we are home nearly all day. What does she have to be anxious about, for the love of god?

• Instacart Incompetence – as Lauren Conrad once told Heidi Montag, you know what you did
• Digital housekeeping – I struggle with keeping my digital (okay, and my analog) house clean. I currently have more than 8000 unread emails. Mistakes have been made. I guess I’m more of a digital working woman vs digital housewife.

• When the Lyft app says your ride will be here in 3 minutes, and then 4, then 7, and then you see their little car icon driving off in the wrong direction like me when I’m playing Lego Star Wars and my avatar keeps running into the wall, only they’re not a Gen Xer playing newfangled video games, they’re allegedly a person who drives for a living.
• People’s mood swings – one minute they’re crying uncontrollably about the injustice of losing screen time after leaving their bowl of yogurt to coagulate in the living room, and the next, they’re unironically live Rick Rolling you as if nothing ever happened. I hear this is particularly common in teens and tweens, but not my perfect angels obviously.

• The Bruins Swindle – Our whole family loves the Bruins. We love Bergie, both Charlies, Marchand. We have inside jokes about how we say “Jake Debrusk” in a really deep voice and how we have to remark on how strong Taylor Hall is several times per game. We love self-passes and power plays, and the Ullmark-Swayman hug on the ice at the end of every game. Since we’re having a staycation – let’s add the word “staycation” to the list of grievances – this year, we figured maybe we’d go see a game live. Four tickets to decent but not extravagant seats at TD Garden will run you about TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS. That is more than most people’s rent! That is obscene. Well, maybe we’ll just get Hazy a jersey for Christmas because she’s such a die-hard fan. Oh what’s that? It’s $180? Was this garment design by Diane Von Furstenburg and sweat on by Charlie McAvoy himself?

I’m sure there’s much more, but I have presents to find, mood swings to placate, and other feats of strength to perform. Wishing everyone a cathartic Festivus and a happy New Year!