Christmas 1991 in Deauville - the closest seaside resort to Paris - a beautiful town in Normandy.
The Decoration is impressive, the Municipality of Deauville, one of the richest in France, transforms the small town into a Christmas village, full of garlands and colorful lanterns, huge mangers, Santa Clauses, decorated fir trees of all sizes; they are dreamy. The decoration of Paris in front of her is really poor.
I live in this wonderful place one third of the year, since I work as a musician in its casino, the biggest and most beautiful in France.
I am drinking coffee with a close friend of mine, 35 years older than me, a professor at the Sorbonne, a psychologist-psychoanalyst.
- The atmosphere is magical, I say, don't you agree?
-Yes, he answers me, but the paradox is that this period is very difficult for most people.
I am surprised and react.
-When I was young, until the end of my school years, I expected how and how I answered her, and I understood that this was what all the people around me, young and old, felt. Of course, it's different now, I work on days like this, but I always like it.
-For children they are usually beautiful, they have holidays, they are waiting for presents, he answered me smiling. And for the very young maybe like you. For adults it is different. For most, it creates anxiety, worry and depression. Emotions complex and contradictory. Great expectations, accounts of the time that has passed, compulsions and obligations to celebrate, to be with family or friends, to be well. And that can't be done. We don't feel good, ready to celebrate, never with a plan. Most of the people who make an appointment with me, confide in me that they are "scared" during this period. It is a landmark-obstacle. The best holidays are the ones we don't expect. The spontaneous, the everyday, the unplanned. In the others there is a bit of hypocrisy and coercion. The same with gifts. And most of the time the celebration fails or for some it is suffering.
I didn't share Jacqueline's opinion. Then.
Now if I had her in front of me - she was also one of the victims of the corona virus two years ago - I would tell her that I would agree with her on most things.
Because I don't believe in God - I'm not an infidel, I believe in man - the religious side of the days goes without saying that it doesn't touch me. I have great respect and understand the sincere grief that faithful Christians can feel. These are few nowadays, I mean those who really believe.
Of course, we can give other meanings to the days of Christmas.
Of hope, of love for anyone else (but these are also of Christian ethics), of peace, of the desire to get together and contact with the people we love, with the family.
All this is beautiful and nice.
I received many wishes, almost all impersonal, sometimes from people I have no contact with, but I am part of their agenda, with one click we wish the same thing to dozens of people (some wishes can be a curse for some), the least lazy ones of course in their grouped wishes, they bother to put the name as well, leaving the content of the message the same for all the faces of the agenda, as well as the various emojis. I personally never send wishes, I prefer to talk with friends.
I feel that at Christmas most people celebrate or rather want to show that they are celebrating, because they have to celebrate, they are not in the mood to celebrate.
We celebrate compulsorily, we are at large tables compulsorily, with family members who are not always in the mood to "celebrate" together, or at least at this time, the children of single-parent families are half dissatisfied, since one of the two parents is missing , there is usually pre-existing tension, new partners when present often create embarrassment for older members of the extended family, when absent they lack and irritate others young or old, the absent are often more present and the present often wish they were elsewhere and with others... in the end the feast of diplomacy and hypocrisy ends, like all obligatory feasts.
Not to be completely negative, there are definitely quite a few people out there who are having a really good time.
As for those who are or feel alone, even when they are with others on this day to celebrate, they experience their loneliness even more intensely.
On TV endless programs about the festive table, with the proposed traditional foods, variations and ideas, mixed with scenes of war from Ukraine and migrant camps, walks in the decorated market, which somehow waits for the season to make the most important part of the annual turnover.
Here is the essence of the celebration.
Trade and merchants celebrate.
It is the celebration of consumption, of consumerism. There are also special consumer loans in many countries especially for the holidays. Which traders prepare, with the necessary decoration from the beginning of November or the end of October. Although a Christian holiday, it is celebrated on all continents.
About a month ago I was in Singapore for business reasons.
I was impressed by the Christmas decorations. Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus, Taoists are the majority of the inhabitants. Christians represent less than 4%.
In the huge department stores and malls, decorated fir trees, endless Merry Christmas, Santa Claus and mangers with the divine baby and wizards. Who is all this for? But, for the Buddhist, Hindu consumer.
At Christmas I have always celebrated the end of them for many years.
*Cover photo: New Year's Eve revelers on the steps of Grand Central Station, circa 1940, Photo FPGHulton ArchiveGetty Images