Thanksgiving was always held at my father’s parents’ house.
Although I loved going there on a regular Sunday, or any other time of year (they were sweet, wonderful people), going there on Thanksgiving was a day I dreaded.
Mainly because of my two aunts, and their families, on my father’s side.
My Uncle Joe was the grand pontificater - he would rant on and on about things he didn’t know anything about. He made FOX news seem liberal and didn’t hesitate to slur any and every ethnic group whenever he had the chance.
My Aunt Kate would also talk, non-stop, for hours on end about absolutely nothing - but loudly. I can’t recall a single thing she ever said, but boy - was she loud.
Back then, there was only one television in the house. The cousins would hog the television and watch one football game after another from early morning until late at night, with the volume up loud enough to disturb the neighbors - perhaps in an attempt to drown out the sound of their parents yapping at the dinner table.
Because the weather was always so crappy (Illinois in November), and there was nothing outside anyway, we were stuck sitting in the house - trapped between the ravings of lunatics and the sound of screaming football broadcasters.
We had to show up for this event about 10:00 AM and would be there usually until about 10:00 PM - a full 12 hours of torture. Oh what I would have given for a laptop computer back in those days, or an iPod, or a cell phone - or a gun.
Yes, I do have fond memories of holidays as a child, but Thanksgiving was not one of them.
And books. I always found some quiet corner and buried myself in a book. I wish I could still do that, but now I have to be all adult and stuff and help make food, clear the table, do the dishes, and pretend to be sociable with my blowhard uncle (do we all have one of those?).
I learned to hate it for a different reason. It seemed Thanksgiving was always out our house, and my parents stressed for several days getting everything in order, barking orders like drill sergeants. And the dishes, my lazy ass relatives wouldn’t go near the kitchen, except to smell the food when it was cooking. All the damn dishes were mine when it came time to clean up it seemed. Fine china and silver, washed by hand because the dishwasher would “ruin” it. Plus, my maternal grandmother was a spoiled bitch who tolerated the grandkids but resented the competition for my mothers attention, add that to a few drinks and she’d sit around and cry. I wouldn’t be allowed to watch that show either.
This year it’s at my daughters house. We bought the bird cooked, (warm only) and those upgraded paper plates. No booze, no beer, no crying allowed.
We always did Thanksgiving at home - but I never enjoyed my relatives either. Loud, prejudiced rednecks. I always took a book along and went in the corner and read.
Were any of you old enough, at these family get togethers, to be put in charge of minding the relatives’ bored brats? I was about 16 when I officially declared myself old enough to sit with the adults rather than riding herd on the kid’s table.
I realized I was leaving the 'rents in the lurch, but you know what? Either pay me the going babysitter rates or Count Me Out. The only thing I had in common with these kids was two legs and paired organs.
