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Thanksgiving, as far as holidays go, is fairly harmless. Except if you consider: a) Thanksgiving opens the floodgates of hell known as "the holiday season" and b) all holidays are way overrated.
illustration by Jason StoutWhy? Because the Holiday Gods are sardonic folk who think it funny to instill great sensations of guilt and obligation upon us on those days known as "special occasions." You may not outwit them by ignoring a holiday, either, for you'll only suffer more.
I know -- I tried skipping Thanksgiving in 1988. I told everyone that someone else had invited me over so people wouldn't feel sorry for me and insist that I come to their house -- which is what people tend to do when they hear you hate holidays. My real plan was to out-and-out ignore the day, a plan that was immediately thwarted by that intangible thing that fills the air on every major holiday. The harder I tried to pretend this was just another day, the more I was overcome with the knowledge it was not.
So, to deal with this nagging "you have to do something" sentiment, I decided to make one small nod to the occasion by heading over to a homeless shelter to dole out yummies to the have-lesses. That would give me a way to commemorate what I could not shut out, and to do so in a way less selfish than sitting around stuffing myself to the gills. I smugly headed to Salvation Army with a song in my heart, glad to be of service on a day when no doubt all others were at home thinking only of themselves.
Duh. What I'd completely forgotten to ask myself when creating my holier-than-thou itinerary was this: When do you suppose the most volunteers show up at homeless shelters to feed the hungry and earn some frequent flyer bonus miles for that future trip to heaven? You got it: holidays. It occurred to me that I could either wrestle an old man to the ground and rip a serving spoon from his hands (so I could be the saint-like server and he could go to hell), or I could leave. That was, honestly, what they needed most from volunteers -- people who would offer to go home and alleviate some of the congestion in the hall.
So, I left.
I went back to the home of the friends who were allowing me to sleep under their makeshift bar while I searched for an apartment. I scratched the dog's butt, opened a can of Spaghetti-O's, slurped it down, and offered the can up for a good canine licking. Then I moped for hours, feeling lonelier than I was, until at last I broke down and accepted a late offer for dessert with a friend's family. As I pulled into the underground parking lot of their high-rise, I heard loud, scraping noises and saw sparks flying all around me. What the hell?
After this happened a number of times, I clicked on the cause-and-effect icon in my brain and realized that the sparks happened whenever my very big camper went under a light fixture. Ah ha! I was shorting out the entire electrical system of the parking garage. Okay, logical solution? Well, surely if I just keep going, thought I, I will come to an exit. This despite how clear the real truth was to the attendant who caught me red-handed (or should I say hot-wired?) and yelled for me to stop, pointing out that my continued descent would never yield an exit, only more smashed bulbs.
And why could I not come to such a simple conclusion on my own? Easy. Like the dangling light fixtures in my path, the wires in my brain were completely loose, thanks to the holiday. Not only would I not have been in this garage had it not been Thanksgiving, but on the incredibly remote chance I had been, I am convinced I would have acted in a less imbecilic fashion. Why? Because my mind would not have been sidetracked at thoughts of how pathetic I was having to weasel a last-minute invitation for pumpkin pie so I could quit feeling sorry for myself on a day I was too weak to ignore as I had sworn I would.
Which is the biggest drawback to holidays. No matter how strong you are on a regular day, holidays have a tendency to kick your emotional ass every time. Just try ignoring a day everyone else is celebrating. If you sit around alone during a holiday, you wind up focusing even harder on the fact it's a holiday. You tell yourself, "I'm so glad I'm not celebrating this holiday." This is evocative of post-break-up behavior where the dumped walks around like a feverish Salinger character (wait, was that Franny or Zoey?) mumbling mantra-like, "I am so much better off without X. I'm never going to think about X again. My gosh, I'm doing a great job not thinking about X."
On the other hand, if you do participate, no matter whom you are with, you still must face inescapable thoughts of the family variety. That is to say, your family. And how screwed up they are. There is no consolation in knowing that, as Mary Karr put it, "A dysfunctional family is one with more than one member." We've all been so warped by sadists like Norman Rockwell and Frank Capra over the years that we are unable to eradicate that unstoppable weed-like myth -- that of "the happy family" and, worse, why ours isn't.
If you aren't with your family, you have to face why not (either they are total freaks or you are the total freak -- neither thought particularly consoling). Worse, if you are with them, you also have to face why (either they are freakishly good at guilting you into being there or you are freakishly susceptible to being guilted). Don't tell me all y'all actually want to be with your extended clan on the holidays. Because I know I'm not the only one out here who has a family that's more Kafka-esque than Capra-esque.
It's not that holidays at my house were bad. I mean the food was good, the company was nice. But the whole thing was as sincere as an arranged marriage is romantic. Sitting down en masse was highly atypical for us nine kids and our harried mother and our grumpy father who couldn't stand to hear us so much as breathe at our last-supper-style dinner table.
Since the only practice we had at this behavior was on Sundays and holidays, to this day obligatory gatherings always make me feel like your toes feel when you try to stretch them out inside of new, too-tight shoes, even though you know you can't, even though you know you shouldn't try. I still fear, based on my childhood Thanksgivings, that I'll be the first to spill the gravy or snort-laugh and shoot potatoes out my nose, both of these immediate grounds for dismissal from the party. Which is another reason to avoid the parties.
But, like a college loan collector calling at 6am on a Saturday morning, holidays just will not go away. Worse, they are something with which to be dealt. Last year, I decided to try to go along with the pleasant plans of my happier friends, to participate without too much fuss, since I knew from experience not participating would be much worse. I invited some friends over -- conveniently enough to my friend Leonard's house (because I only have two chairs and Leonard has lots). Leonard invited over some friends, too.
We opted for a potluck, so no one person had to have a nervous breakdown if everything was burnt. Surprisingly, no one brought any food item that looked or smelled scary. Unbelievably, the non-smokers did not glare at the smokers. Nor did the vegetarians make snide remarks about the bird. The adults played Twister with the children. The children kept their pugilistic tendencies in check for most of the night. The dogs got some white meat hidden in their kibble -- pearls in their oysters. My gosh, you could've sliced the thankfulness in the air with an electric carving knife.
So why then did I still feel uptight? Why, if I was surrounded by laid back friends who love each other, did I stand in the kitchen and do the dishes the whole night? Because, I honestly do not think I will ever escape the spectre of falseness which, for me, affixes itself to all holidays. None of my friends were being false, mind you, but neither was this a much-preferred spontaneous gathering. We all decided to be with other people (each other that is) on this day because otherwise, we risked feeling lonely or like losers. That's what I hate most: Blissful solitude is wrecked when a desire for such falls on a holiday. Of course, maybe I was the token curmudgeon. Maybe everyone else actually looked forward to the occasion. Maybe that's why I had a little fun in spite of myself.
My inadvertant sensations of happiness, though, were tempered by the dissatisfaction brought on by the glaring lack of rudeness among us. For what is a holiday without a rousing row at the dinner table? It's been years since I joined my family (now extended to over 30 people, my son and I the only non-attendants) for a forced feast. Still, as the amputated limb of the family tree, I suffer the phantom pains of missing having my buttons pushed by my kin -- folks who could put even the most skilled elevator operator to shame. People who can find a way to turn the simplest sentence into an accusation. "Could you pass the peas? Oh, that reminds me, when are you going to ever get a grip on your life?"
Still, because last year's feast was actually more enjoyable than it was not, I have decided to try to accept this year's holidays with as little grimness as possible. Again I will spend the day with friends. But I will not spend the entire night washing dishes, hiding in the kitchen. I am going to learn to like the holidays, I swear I am, because there are some things bigger than me out there and apparently Thanksgiving is one of these things. This year, I will not think one bad thought about my family far away. This year, I'm leaving my cynical side at home.
I encourage you to do the same. If you can't avoid grimness, try to forget guilt, anyway. If you hate turkey, eat ravioli. Know that you aren't inadequate if the family you gather with is a mismatched collage of dogs and recovering alcoholics and amicable ex-boyfriends and lone wolf co-workers and not one biological relationship can be found anywhere in the whole group.
This is not really my advice to you. This is my channeling advice I got from Serena, the 81-year-old token grandmother who showed up at Leonard's house last year in a brightly colored, crocheted vest, fire engine red lipstick, and a sparkle in her eyes that could not have been bought at any store. Serena (I'm not making her name up) is a woman who holds that coveted position of being old enough to know very important things like, for instance, life isn't about crushes on guys. Or that you should be as forthright in your observations and statements as an unintimidated little child.
Serena told me everything she could think of about herself at that party, from her recipe for cranberry sauce ("Use some red Jell-O -- it sweetens up the tartness."), to her failed marriage ("And we were married over 20 years."), to her 10 years in Israel ("You can imagine -- it changed my life."), and 25 years in Nebraska ("Oy, I hated it.")
All this and more. But the words I remember clearest are the words that fell like diamonds from her ruby lips as she gave me permission to do whatever makes me happy, including coming up with my own ways to make peace with holidays. This permission, which I pass onto you -- to help you through the season about to besiege us -- she summed up succinctly as she kissed me good night. "Follow your bliss," she said, "follow your bliss."
Free words on a forced day of festivity. Wisdom I was thankful for. A gift from a woman I would not have met if not for the occasion of the occasion.
Spike Gillespie is obviously not the crank she likes to make herself out to be, and points to her well-adjusted son Henry as proof. You can subscribe, absolutely free, to her weekly online column by dropping her a note at spikeG@prodigy.com.
