Some of you might remember that New York Times article published in early 2021 that finally gave name to the “not-doing-great” but also “not-quite-depressed” feeling we were experiencing collectively in the early days of Covid. Enter Languishing: The it-emotion of the pandemic, defined as “the opposite of thriving.” Based on some Substack field observations [1][2][3][4] , languishing, or at the very least boredom, seems to be a dominant emotion this Summer too.
June Gloom and its associated dreary ennui are a California thing, but I’ll venture to say that the East Coast has a similar thing going on this year: weeks of rain-less cloud systems blanketing the city in a hazy white sheet. The day feels like a sigh. I’m not full-on depressed exactly, I don’t feel hopeless, I’m just…uninspired.
In an ugly juxtaposition, my stagnant, social media WFH job leaves me feeling restless, pacing about my room like a caged animal wondering “what can I do to lighten the mood in here?” “How can I make this more fun?”
The answer: Some good ol’ fashioned play-pretend.
By dressing myself and my room in vintage aesthetics, I make-believe that I’m a sad woman in the past instead of a sad woman today.
The reality is that I’d have much worse things to worry about if I was a woman 100 years ago, but working in social media for over a year and soaking in our current digital dystopia has made it comforting to fantasize about a curated past where everything feels more concrete, vivid, slow. When our delights and our ailments were contingent on matters of the physical world, not the virtual. I might sound like a bitter “back in my day”-ass boomer, but no one’s summer mood board has pictures of them staring at their phone, checking who’s liked their story. I will gladly pretend for a day that my biggest problem is avoiding the Spanish flu.
Maybe your character is Juliet, maybe she’s Daisy Buchanan, Odette, or Rose from Titanic. She can be Ancient, Shakespearean, Victorian, or Mid-Century. The specific era she comes from isn’t that important, but she’s never seen an iPhone or used the internet, and that’s the most important thing about her.
This little game I play with myself has been helpful, and maybe it can be so for you, too. Here are four low-effort, high-reward ways you can cast a comforting, vintage mood over your day and turn languish into languor.
1. Vapors
To create your old-timey ambiance, you must envelop yourself in vapors. I enjoy using this term as opposed to “scents” or “fragrances” because of its archaic use as a catch-all for women’s neurosis. If you were experiencing psychological distress as a woman, you were said to be having a “fit of the vapours”. Think hysteria. I can’t believe hysterectomies are still called that.
Light candles, incense, palo santo, apply your favorite perfume, slick your hands and face with a rich body oil. Exorbitance is key for this character; she’s frantically trying to drown her sorrows with perfumes and creams that are probably full of radium. When I think of this character languishing in her chamber, she smells strong and complex, like you might get a headache if you sit near her for too long.
A woman’s lot is to suffer.
- Min Jin Lee, Pachinko
2. Sad Sounds
Music is key to mood-setting, and your character wants the perfect melancholy melodies to languish to.
While Bob Dylan was still in diapers, Connie Converse and Molly Drake were busy inventing the folk singer/songwriter genre, years ahead of their time and decades away from recognition.
Connie Converse literally disappeared without a trace in 1974, and her music was lost to time until decades later. She’d be turning 100 this August. Molly Drake (mother of musician Nick Drake) was similarly private about her musicianship and her songs weren’t compiled and released until 2013.
It’s a shock to listen to these songs for the first time, to hear this contemporary genre being sung with their lonely transatlantic voices, dotted by the crackle of aged vinyl.
I don’t know if Molly and Connie ever knew of each other, but I think they would have been good friends to each other.
“Only women’s lives can be tragic; about men there is always something comic”
- Sigrid Nunez paraphrasing Lacan
3. Willowy Gown
The actual dress-up part. No garment encapsulates the state of languish quite like a fluttery, floor length gown. As a former ballet dancer, I’ve learned that the longer the character’s dress is, the more tragic her story will be. A long dress is a ball and chain, an easy reach for dark subterranean forces to snag you by and pull you down under. Take Ophelia up top, her dress weighing her down so the river can consume her. Or Persephone below, her gown making it simple for Hades to steal her for the underworld.
As you move slowly about your day, put on a long vintage dress that will match your speed, flowing lightly in the wake of your movement, picking up dust. Let it trail behind you lazily as you pace your hallway, let it tangle around your knees as you sprawl on your bed. Now you’re just literary.
4. Lipstick
Our mouths betray so many of our emotions. They’re the first to quiver when we’re going to cry, the first to give away our winning hand, and the first part of our body to reach out for romance. That’s why I paint a bold, angular red lip onto my face on days I feel sad. I can catch glimpses of myself in the mirror throughout the day and see a pop of confidence overlayed on my weak face. Going for a vintage look too, an exaggerated cupid’s bow for example, pushes the escapism further. No one wearing lipstick like this would have to stare at a computer screen for 8 hours.
I’ve also been enjoying the experience of applying Axiology’s balmies, which look like crayons, smell like iron, and live in a tiny box. I imagine that’s what a lot of early cosmetics were like - unscented, unprocessed, derived from the earth.
In late high school, post skins-era tumblr culture, “stop romanticizing mental illness” was the hot woke take my friends and I liked to insert into every conversation. So while I hesitate to tell you to romanticize your malaise, I will gladly advocate for a bit of healthy escapism. I’m not suggesting to try running away from your emotions, but rather to run away with them. If you can’t escape melancholia, you may as well play with her a little, dress her up. Engage in a little time travel with her. It’s symptom relief, not a cure.
Ok fine, maybe I am telling you to romanticize your sadness a little bit. Just as long as you do so responsibly.
Thank you for reading.
Beautiful <3