For a lot of Americans, Thanksgiving means group celebration and the ritual turkey. But for others of us, Thanksgiving can bring feelings of alienation, anxiety, and sadness. We feel good about holidays yet we feel bad if we don’t think we’re doing them right, and not celebrating them the way other people do. In a binary, heteronormative culture, it can be a particularly hurtful experience to go through the holidays envying the bland, canned family image fed to us by mainstream media.
You know — the Disney/Hollywood/Hallmark edition of American holidays, replete with contented elders, proud parents, merry children, and unidentified token characters to fill out the appropriately American picture. Not a single drunk in the room, nor talks of politics? Huh. That really IS a fantasy.
As people who reject building our lives around false models of what people are *supposed* to do at any given time, it stands to reason that we need to make our own rules, based on our needs and beliefs as free people.
Here are 3 commonsense hacks to help you through the season.
You don’t have to celebrate with a crowd. Why must national holidays torture introverts? Don’t be fooled. Whether you are single or married, your celebration of the American holiday is just as valid if you do it alone as with a group. That’s right — you don’t need a group of people who annoy you or make you feel awkward to validate your experience of an American holiday.
While tv commercials make it seem as if everyone has a happy group of blood-relatives to visit for the holidays, in reality, tens of millions of Americans don’t have that option for tens of millions of reasons, from disabilities to work schedules. Still, tv shows and social propaganda continue to hammer on the notion that unless we unite with a full cast of Lifetime movie characters, we’re not doing it right. Millions more grudgingly attend stress-filled dinners that can cause panic attacks, PTSD flashbacks, and regrets.
For the Pilgrims, Thanksgiving was more like a day of prayer followed by an extended business dinner with trading parties. The holiday celebrates the historic friendships that were won through that mutual cooperation (while we try not to think of how Europeans then abused those friendships).
For free people, it’s a holiday where we can celebrate how grateful we are NOT to sit in traffic or endure micro-aggressions and aggravation. It’s a day to be thankful for the things we DO have, not angry or moping about what we don’t because tv has convinced us there’s only one right way to enjoy the holiday. That kind of thinking makes you the turkey.
You don’t have to eat turkey. Turkey is basically propaganda. That’s right, I’m calling bullshit on our sacred bird. The Pilgrims’ version of Thanksgiving makes ours look like what it is these days — an ad for turkey farmers. The history of the turkey’s place in American holidays is long and complicated. Historians aren’t certain Pilgrims ate turkey. The tradition of serving turkey — and the establishment of Thanksgiving as a national holiday — was largely due to an obscure 19th c. American editor, Sarah Josepha Hale, considered “the godmother” of Thanksgiving. It was her passion for the bird which drove people to adopt it as a holiday food just after the Civil War.
In the 21st century, people are easing up on traditional foods. Even if you’re attending a traditional dinner, you can let your host quietly know that you’re on a special diet and that even though everything looks magnificent, you are sticking with (fill in the blank with anything you want from their feast — or bring a secret stash of tastier foods you can discreetly munch on.)
Assuming you get the joy of spending the day alone or with an amiable, low-key friend or your sweet and cozy pets, the best meal to have to celebrate a day of Thanksgiving is the food you totally love and don’t get to eat as often as you wish, whether because it takes time to cook, is expensive, or is hard to source. Purchase or order in advance (like RIGHT NOW) and then, on the big day, sleep late, wake up relaxed, slide into sweat pants, and serve yourself food you thoroughly relish. Then you’ll feel THANKFUL for the food — which is a mood far closer in spirit to the Pilgrims’ appreciating their feast than reluctantly eating mediocre meats and side-dishes not good enough to eat year-round. Goodbye, mince pie!
And if you love turkey, don’t stint yourself. Roast a plump tit. I mean, get a small breast, follow these directions, and get your favorite sides to go with.
Thanksgiving is for you, so own it. You have a nationally sanctioned day to pig out and feel good about life. If you’re staying home, you can drink and party as you wish. You can hang out in your super-comfiest clothes or your craziest fetish outfit or go naked all day. You can jerk off or watch Galaxy Quest for the 600th time. You do you, darling — and feel good about it too.
Make it a day of relaxation or productivity for yourself by doing that thing you keep saying you’ll do, whether it’s installing a shelf, setting up a new device, or giving yourself spa treatments and self-care. Have the most fun you can for one reason and one reason only: you made it to another Thanksgiving! Thank God you’re alive, you beautiful human, you.
All Americans who celebrate holidays alone by choice or by circumstance are as important as the ones who participate in traditional gatherings. We need to remember there are introverts who can’t handle parties, and others who, for a range of reasons, celebrate alone. Think of all the people in hospitals, shut-ins, disabled folks at home, people estranged from their families, orphans, prisoners and the people who guard them, military men and women, doctors and nurses and first responders and so many more others we depend on to keep our infrastructure going. We should honor and respect their experience too.
It’s time for everyone to quit trying to live up to fake ideals and unrealistic standards about how to celebrate a national holiday and allow themselves the freedom to enjoy Thanksgiving as a day of spiritual healing. To celebrate Thanksgiving is to feel thankful for what our European and Indigenous founders achieved on that day — peacefulness based on mutual respect and gratitude. Thanksgiving belongs to everyone who calls themselves American.
