Not long ago, the New York Times published a story about a new and odd ritual that had emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic: Mothers screaming into the void. The women profiled in the story were from Boston and “exhausted” because “for nearly two years, they have been trapped” by the nation’s pandemic restrictions. Twenty of them decided to assemble on a high school football field to scream together.

“Their voices, which carried years of pain and rage that they could finally release, merged into an anguished chorus,” the Times reported. The organizer of the event runs a “mom wellness” website and teaches yoga; she initiated each new round of mom-screaming “by raising two light-up unicorn wands.”