I don’t want to rain on anyone’s Turkey Day parade. Really, I don’t. Go enjoy your roasted turkey, globs of cranberry sauce, and stuffing made by someone who insists it’s the best ever. Sit around with your family, reminiscing about the past or discussing the latest Netflix show everyone binged watch. Please enjoy.
I should keep this to myself but something about this holiday has always irked me. Maybe its because as a kid we would go to my grandmother’s house. I enjoyed seeing my uncle (note I said uncle, not uncles), grandparents, aunt, and on rare occasion, the cousins. That was the great part but after that, it slid down hill fairly rapidly.
The women would huddle together in a kitchen too small for that many cooks while the men would lounge in the living room, watching TV.
But I always wanted to watch the New York Macy’s Thanksgiving but was denied this pleasure because the men had to control the TV. They would select a show with sportscasters talking about a football game that didn’t start until 6 hours later.
Then we’d eat around noon, your typical meal of turkey, green bean casserole, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, stuffing and cranberry “sauce”. The turkey was always dry, and honestly, flavorless. It took gravy to salvage it and it should be noted, roasted meat should not be a vehicle for sauce.
There’s something about green beans that make me shudder and the sweet potatoes were a pile of sticky sweet sickness, marshmallows and honey dumped on mashed sweet potatoes. The cranberry was the gelatinous tube from the can. The mashed potatoes made my stomach hurt because it had two sticks of butter and a cup of cream in them. The only things that turned out OK was the stuffing, but only if it was stove top.
To this day, the fondness for traditional Thanksgiving foods eludes me.
But the best part was yet to come. As nearly every adult person at the “big persons” table lit cigarettes and proceeded to chain smoke, the arguing would begin. Yelling at each other over dumb stuff.
My uncle declared he invented the mountain bike one year. Someone pointed out that was a lie. Obviously. Argument ensued. They argued about politics, about the right order to eat your food, about was OK or not OK to put ashtrays on the table, about the latest popular children’s toy. Ahem, I’m looking at you Cabbage Patch doll.
One year there was even an argument about whether they would have an argument.
Afterwards, the men would stroll back into the living room to watch more blathering about the upcoming football games while the women would clean up the table and start washing the dishes. What a horrible sexist holiday.
On an occasion we would drive to Louisiana to spend the holiday with my dad’s mother, who insisted we call her Grandmother Carter, like we were kids out of a Charles Dickens novel.
There was no arguing here, mostly because we sat around in silence. My dad would mutate into this man with perfect posture, a strange fake laugh, and not much opinion on anything. In short, he became a different person around his mother. The food was the same dried out meats and sides as usual.
The main take away from those visits was the clock in her kitchen. A digital clock that glowed orange at night. I always wanted that clock.
Even as I became older, the holiday still doesn’t hold much appeal. While we no longer argue at actual Thanksgiving lunch, we will argue the days ahead of it, always about what we were going to do.
It need not be this complicated.
And someone will pout, a grown ass adult pouting mostly likely because something was served they didn’t like, spaghetti, enchiladas, Chinese food, or heaven’s forbid, meat on the bone.
I say we cancel the meal part, get together and drink champagne. Let’s truly celebrate being thankful.
Look, you can even do
“The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear.”