mono.

About a month ago, I was sitting in a café, and Christmas music was playing in the background. What used to be a feeling of excitement hearing cheery and heartfelt holiday songs has turned into indifference. That’s what I noticed.

Growing up, Christmas music was the soundtrack of my -BER months. Throughout my teenage years and my 20s, as soon as the snow hit the ground late October, I would start blasting It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas, put up the tree, go coffee shop hopping for more cosy vibes, and just allow the holiday season to envelop me in its “magic”. Back then, Christmas music was more than just a sound – it was a feeling. It was wonder, it was comfort.  

Now, in my 30s, the idea of Christmas music feels distant, like a relic of a version of me I no longer fully recognize. Life is busier, packed with feliz navideadlines, and the unrelenting motion of adulthood. The days blur into one another, leaving little room to pause, let alone savour the nostalgia of Jose Mari Chan’s Christmas in Our Hearts. The cheer of Jingle Bells can feel at odds with the complexity of adult life, where the season is no longer solely about being merry-and-bright but also about balancing responsibilities, managing expectations, and sometimes confronting grief and loss. Even when December arrives, it feels more like a reminder of things I have to do – pick up presents, bake holiday treats, this-and-that – rather than a season to be celebrated. I used to be excited doing all these little things, like no depression can hold me down and ruin my festive mood as long as I’m hearing “just hear those sleigh bells jingling, ring tingle tingling tooooo”. But now, the thought of sitting down to soak in the music feels indulgent, almost foreign. Maybe Christmas music feels too perfect? The simplicity of those melodies feels conflicting from the layered realities of a woman in her 30s during December. 

It’s not that I’ve grown to dislike Christmas. Hey, I still love Christmas (although it also has always given me a hint of a melancholic feeling ever since), but the music no longer resonates in the way it once did. Perhaps it’s the weight of time – how the years pile on, revealing how much I have changed. Songs that once brought joy and giddy feelings now carry a tinge of nostalgia so sharp, it feels almost somber. Now, when I hear Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, it leaves me wistful, as though I am reaching for a moment in the past that I can never quite grasp again. 

But I think it’s not really the busyness that has turned my good-vibes-only feeling to indifference. It’s the realization that I’ve outgrown the pure excitement I used to feel. The twinkling Christmas lights and cheerful tones used to symbolize happiness uncomplicated by time. Now, the notes ring hollow, a reminder of how such feeling has faded. 

Then there’s the sheer repetitiveness of it all. Year after year, the same songs echo through the malls, restaurants, everywhere – like a merciless loop that does not recognize the varied emotions the holidays bring. It’s not just the overexposure or the dissonance. Part of me feels that subconsciously, I avoid Christmas music by way of guarding something fragile; because listening to those songs used to feel like unwrapping a gift, one that contained a simpler version of myself. Now, I worry that hearing them too often will wear away the remnants of that sense of wonder, leaving nothing but familiarity. It’s as if by keeping my distance, I can preserve the joy I once felt for another time, another moment when I might need it more. 

I’m not gonna lie – it is somber as heck, this shift. But allow me to say it’s also deeply human. I think growing up often means that the way we experience joy changes. Perhaps it’s less about distancing myself from Christmas music, and more about making peace with that fact that its role in my life has evolved. Still, not all the music is lost to me. Yesterday, after work, I went to decompress in a café nearby. I heard Nat King Cole’s The Christmas Song, and I paused. In that moment, the song didn’t demand joy or force nostalgia. Instead, it offered something gentler, a space of reflection, a quiet acknowledgement of time passing. And maybe, that’s enough for now. 

I no longer feel excited to listen to Christmas music as soon as the holiday season begins, and that’s okay. I’m learning to meet it where I am, rather than where I once was. Perhaps one day, the “magic” will return, or perhaps it will transform into something different, more enduring. For now, though, I’m content to let the songs rest. I will replace the music with quiet moments, the warmth of small connections; and allow myself the grace to feel all the feelings, and reflect what this season means to me, here in the fullness of my 30s.