22nd Nov 2006
Thanksgiving
I’ve had several conversations recently about Thanksgiving on the phone, in cars to and from LAX, and in person while helping hose off an outdoor chair used to seat the twenty-fifth guest. This informal research has led me to think that people fall into generally three camps for Thanksgiving:
1. “I love my family and they’re just about perfect.” I think of this as a form of denial, but that may just be cynicism. I hope this world exists. I hope these families exist. These folks spend Thanksgiving with their families. Often there is a sing-a-long involved. No alienation is involved.
2. “My family is effed up, but I still love them.” These folks also spend Thanksgiving with their families. There isn’t a formal sing-a-long, but, in the car on the way home afterward, there may be a scream-a-long. There is a fair amount of alienation involved.
3. “I’m going to Las Vegas for Thanksgiving.” These folks spend Thanksgiving in an alternative arrangement. It doesn’t need to be Las Vegas. There is a fair amount of alienation involved, but participants decide that this alternative arrangement #3 is less painful/alienating/gut-wrenching than arrangement #2.
I’m not sure what to advise here, or how it has to do with “work,” but know that if you fall into one of those three categories, you are perfectly normal and so is your family. And if there’s a fourth category, feel free to post in comments.
For a more uplifting take on the holiday, check out Patry Francis’s blog, Simply Wait.
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