I live in the Northeast US where we get cold and snow about six months of the year. The other six months of the year tend to be quite lovely, but as I’m not overly fond of snow and freezing my butt off, winter is not my favorite season. Even today as I write this it’s 40 degrees F and raining on top of the inches of snow we have on the ground. Unfortunately, tonight it’s going down into the teens and snowing. So by tomorrow morning it’ll be frozen snow, a layer of ice, and then fresh snow on top. Basically, layers of cold misery.
I’m usually okay getting through the November and December months of winter because there are the holidays to enjoy and lots of spending time with family. However, once January rolls around and winter persists and usually gets worse, it’s hard to not sink into a pit of winter despair. If I was a wild animal, I would definitely hibernate until May when all the snow has passed. But as I’m a human mom who needs to take care of kids, cats, work, and paying bills, I must stay awake during daylight hours.
When I don’t have my youngest daughter with me, once it gets dark, the temptation to go right to bed can be quite strong. Sleeping that many hours though isn’t really necessary and fortunately I have some things that help me stay awake and also help banish the winter blues. Those “things” are the MMORPGs I play. Namely, FFXIV, World of Warcraft, and Guild Wars 2. Within those games, I’m very lucky to have some great friends to play with and being with them keeps my mind off the cold blech outside my windows.
Even when my game friends aren’t online, being in a world full of lots of other players helps me feel less alone and like I’m part of something bigger. I am fortunate that I haven’t encountered much negativity within most of the games I play, but even when I do experience it, I know I’ll probably never see that person or those people again in the game. There are so many people playing varied content and plus I have such a large number of different characters I play, that encountering someone twice is quite rare. And when it has happened, thus far it’s been all positive experiences.
I don’t know if it’s that I give off 47-year-old crazy cat lady vibes or what, but most people pretty much leave me alone in games. To be honest, the most interaction I get is in FFXIV. Now and then I get compliments on one of my Duskwight Elezen ladies and that always makes me happy. Or even just receiving commendations after doing a dungeon or raid makes me feel seen and appreciated in some small way. Plus, sometimes when running alliance raids, some of the conversations among the groups are quite amusing and interesting.
It today’s world, it can be so easy to just disconnect, it can even be healthy to do so when the ridiculous state of the world becomes too much. I also think that’s it’s important to stay connected in a good way to other human beings, especially those who love and play the same games. There’s still so much good that humanity can and will do and I think we need to come together and be as strong as we can amid challenges. Even something as simple as being rescued out of an AOE by a healer in a raid reminds me that people still care.
Winter especially makes me want to crawl into a hole and hide and the larger state of the world doesn’t help, but the games I play bring me out of that darkness and restore my faith and hope in the light that still exists. I try to focus on the positive experiences in the games I play and forget any speedbumps that try to get me off course. In the games I play, I can be whoever I want in a fictional world and be reminded that I am strong, we’re all strong, and that strength can help us all get through all the days ahead.
Srinity 