So I have shared before that I am in a new school that is in a more conservative community than I have been in a long time. Mostly that specifically Christian religious holidays are a big deal. It seems fine with the community overall, and I am one of the few who is REALLY uncomfortable. Since I am the new person I am working with it, just not doing Christmas or Easter in my program.
However there is still the assumption that I am Christian, and that my assistant is Christian (actually practicing Jewish). People have been talking to me and said things like 'well we know we can't use Christmas colors because someone will have an issue'. I am the one who would actually have the issue. Of course I get wished Merry Christmas and Happy Easter a lot, I say thank you and I hope you have a good holiday. Sometimes parents will notice and give me a serious double take.
So today was the weirdest with my roommate. I said a student wanted to basically create an Easter egg hunt on Friday, and I said no. Of course professionally and in a caring way. My roommate said that I could do it next year, so I said I didn't do religious holidays in public school. Her response was that since the bunny was not in the Bible then it wasn't religious so I should be able to do it in school. I told her I didn't want to, it was not necessary to a good and fun program, and my family does not do Easter. I think of how many people may feel really out of place around these holidays. I also think about people with really crappy, abusive families who may have bad memories of holidays. I got more pressure this year to like Christmas than ever before, I started to think about people who have trauma around holidays or depression.
So yeah, just blowing off steam because I stay professional.