In the Style of a Party

There is a distinct and terrible lack of parties in everyone’s life nowadays. When was the last time that you, as an adult, attended a birthday party? The defining event of our childhoods quickly fade into obscurity as soon as teenage pretentiousness takes hold. If you’re lucky, perhaps your family still does birthday parties: there is cake and presents and everyone attends and celebrates. Many others no longer have birthday parties, and are certainly not invited to them.

But, let us leave birthday parties to the side. The only celebration– or party– that is almost guaranteed every year is Christmas (and Thanksgiving, if you are American, which happens criminally close to Christmas and leaves the rest of the year an gaping hole). But even this holiday has been diminished in its greatness:  the twelve days of Christmas have been reduced to the day of Christmas, which is ridiculous, since the Catholic Church indeed celebrates the feast for forty days. 

What happened to Easter celebrations? Celebrations of marriages, of babies? What about celebrations for graduations and career advancements? Celebrations to mark the turning of the seasons? The feast days of the great saints? Valentines’ Day was a big deal when we were all children who wrote each other heart cards and shared chocolates. No longer. And St. Patrick’s Day has faded into obscurity, unless you have red hair. 

This is a shame. More than a shame: this is a travesty. A moral problem. It is the undoing of our communities and our social spheres. If we live in the apparent era of loneliness, then it is only exaggerated by our lack of parties. There is an epidemic of depression, and an epidemic of no-parties.  I am by no means arguing that the only reason everyone is miserable and lonely is because they haven’t received a party invitation, but I suspect it to be a key factor in the issue. 

When one thinks of a party, there are images of good food, plentifully spread out over tables. Perhaps there are low ceilings, and everyone is slightly crammed in together, all laughing, with the low lights lending a gentle glow to the room. Or it is picnic blankets spread on the grass, with cupcakes and fresh fruit, and presents wrapped and placed in the corner. It might be large Christmas trees dominating a large ballroom, where you are mingling with people you love and new acquaintances. Certain aspects remain the same, regardless of the party one is attending: there is cheer, food, and friends, both old and new.

Parties are a permission for mirth and joy. They render weight and importance to even the most mundane day. In the words of Chesterton, “The first fact about the celebration of a birthday is that it is a way of affirming defiantly, and even flamboyantly, that it is a good thing to be alive.” Celebrations, parties, they are affirmations of the importance of life, of joy. If there is nothing worth celebrating, then certainly nothing is worth doing anymore. Would there be any point in achieving a new stage, if there was no celebration of the effort and time it took? If we ignored graduates and did not celebrate their success, would anyone feel a sense of accomplishment at having graduated? Perhaps some of the more internally motivated would be content with the fact of the graduation, but they would not feel joyful. Joy requires other people. It is not simply infectious, it is like a moss: it can only take root in the proper conditions. The act of the party fosters this growth and facilitates joy.

Our social bonds have suffered because there are no more celebrations. No one feels as if they know any of their neighbours. Because they don’t! Because there have been no invitations to share in their lives, through celebration. If we wish to have friends, we must invite people to share the goodness of our lives. In turn, they will share the goodness of their lives. And then, in time, there will be friendship, reverie, and merriness. Moss, once it is rooted, does not die easily. It might go dormant, when times are difficult (but even the funeral is a type of “party” for the dead, complete with feasting, toasting, and good clothing: even death is given a celebration, because in the Christian world, we know it is merely the beginning of a better life), but it comes back with a sprinkle of water.

Parties are necessary for humans. We are not made to live alone, because we are made to celebrate together. It is imperative that we return to parties, that we return to celebrating. Take your cue from the Catholic Church who, though they have periods of fasting and abstinence, make up for them with wonderful feasting and celebrations. The Church, in all Her Wisdom, even punctuates such  serious seasons  as Lent with first-class feast days that provide a relief from the mourning to give everyone a chance to celebrate. We might learn from this two-thousand year institution: there is reason to celebrate, and God wishes us to take them. He is Joy, after all.