It’s that time of year again and once again I am sick of it already.
All the freaking talk of holiday dinners/togetherness and other bullshit - top it off with people telling me to give to the “less fortunate” and it’s borderline maddening.
First - why the hell do we have people standing at every big box telling me to buy a toy and give it to them so they can give it to some poor immigrant child who comes from a family who doesn’t believe in Christ and doesn’t celebrate Christmas?!? Why do people feel they are making a difference in anything but the bottom line of Walmart selling more toys and the pawn shop buying this stuff on December 26th for 5 cents on the dollar.
Then there’s the bombarding of ads showing happy families celebrating and friends gathering for holiday parties. Get real - 90% of family gatherings don’t go like that and most holiday parties are 3 extroverts ordering everyone around and a bunch of people trying to figure out how to make an Irish exit.
Maybe it’s my memories of holidays past that’s jaded me. Thanksgiving used to be a bigger thing - growing up it was butchering week on the farm. Yea - we were back country red necks who kept up traditions from the depression era many years past - we raised our own hogs and slaughtered them on Thanksgiving week. It was a big thing as most of the aunts/uncles/cousins and such had scattered to the cities and taken factory jobs - but every thanksgiving of course plants closed and didn’t reopen until the following Monday giving the employees a chance to enjoy a long weekend.
Everyone would come back to the family homestead Wed night and we would tap a keg - setting up for a virtual production line of a slaughterhouse in the garages. Thursday we’d have a big T-day meal followed by an afternoon of work and then everyone gathered in the living room - playing cards, music and socializing. Friday morning started with a huge breakfast featuring scapple (look it up if you don’t know - basically cornmeal, spices and bits of hog scraps) which I still miss - and then back to work before finishing that night. Huge meal again and again more cards.
Saturday morning the men went on a deer hunt and women socialized/cleaned and went shopping in town. Back together for one big party Saturday night with all the friends and then church on Sunday morning before going back to the cities. This tradition continued until the early 80s when my grandparents passed and it went away. I was like 12 the last time we did it - but still miss it.
Then there was the tradition I started about 30 years ago - long before we had ever heard of “Friendsgiving” we made our own. Started with a chance meeting of a bunch of us at the neighborhood bar Wed night at the local small town bar (those who lived in small towns know what the bar scene is like day before Thanksgiving) - at this time I was on the outs with my limited family so no big plans the next day - a lot of my friends simply had no family or didn’t speak with theirs so we decided to do our own Thanksgiving at the local Dennys at 2AM. Wound up with around 30 of us - singing (badly) - inviting other patrons and staff to join in and passing a half gallon of Segrams 7 around - it became a tradition for a few years. Eventually things kinda faded like any tradition - people got married and fell into new families - others passed way too young. But we had a strong 10 years of it all through our 20s and I still miss those days.
Yea - as we get older I guess we miss the traditions we had and lost and it sucks. Suppose I should be thankful for many things this year - not the least is being alive to celebrate them. Still I just don’t feel like celebrating - this will be the first year without the old homestead being in the family and it sucks. Got no family left aside from the Mrs and don’t get to see the few friends left nearly as much as we’ve moved from having kids on to having grandkids. Before it’s just been the casino buffet on holidays - but we stopped that a few years back when we moved away from casinos. This year - who knows - we could drive up to the casino I guess - but they are such depressing places on holidays.
All the freaking talk of holiday dinners/togetherness and other bullshit - top it off with people telling me to give to the “less fortunate” and it’s borderline maddening.
First - why the hell do we have people standing at every big box telling me to buy a toy and give it to them so they can give it to some poor immigrant child who comes from a family who doesn’t believe in Christ and doesn’t celebrate Christmas?!? Why do people feel they are making a difference in anything but the bottom line of Walmart selling more toys and the pawn shop buying this stuff on December 26th for 5 cents on the dollar.
Then there’s the bombarding of ads showing happy families celebrating and friends gathering for holiday parties. Get real - 90% of family gatherings don’t go like that and most holiday parties are 3 extroverts ordering everyone around and a bunch of people trying to figure out how to make an Irish exit.
Maybe it’s my memories of holidays past that’s jaded me. Thanksgiving used to be a bigger thing - growing up it was butchering week on the farm. Yea - we were back country red necks who kept up traditions from the depression era many years past - we raised our own hogs and slaughtered them on Thanksgiving week. It was a big thing as most of the aunts/uncles/cousins and such had scattered to the cities and taken factory jobs - but every thanksgiving of course plants closed and didn’t reopen until the following Monday giving the employees a chance to enjoy a long weekend.
Everyone would come back to the family homestead Wed night and we would tap a keg - setting up for a virtual production line of a slaughterhouse in the garages. Thursday we’d have a big T-day meal followed by an afternoon of work and then everyone gathered in the living room - playing cards, music and socializing. Friday morning started with a huge breakfast featuring scapple (look it up if you don’t know - basically cornmeal, spices and bits of hog scraps) which I still miss - and then back to work before finishing that night. Huge meal again and again more cards.
Saturday morning the men went on a deer hunt and women socialized/cleaned and went shopping in town. Back together for one big party Saturday night with all the friends and then church on Sunday morning before going back to the cities. This tradition continued until the early 80s when my grandparents passed and it went away. I was like 12 the last time we did it - but still miss it.
Then there was the tradition I started about 30 years ago - long before we had ever heard of “Friendsgiving” we made our own. Started with a chance meeting of a bunch of us at the neighborhood bar Wed night at the local small town bar (those who lived in small towns know what the bar scene is like day before Thanksgiving) - at this time I was on the outs with my limited family so no big plans the next day - a lot of my friends simply had no family or didn’t speak with theirs so we decided to do our own Thanksgiving at the local Dennys at 2AM. Wound up with around 30 of us - singing (badly) - inviting other patrons and staff to join in and passing a half gallon of Segrams 7 around - it became a tradition for a few years. Eventually things kinda faded like any tradition - people got married and fell into new families - others passed way too young. But we had a strong 10 years of it all through our 20s and I still miss those days.
Yea - as we get older I guess we miss the traditions we had and lost and it sucks. Suppose I should be thankful for many things this year - not the least is being alive to celebrate them. Still I just don’t feel like celebrating - this will be the first year without the old homestead being in the family and it sucks. Got no family left aside from the Mrs and don’t get to see the few friends left nearly as much as we’ve moved from having kids on to having grandkids. Before it’s just been the casino buffet on holidays - but we stopped that a few years back when we moved away from casinos. This year - who knows - we could drive up to the casino I guess - but they are such depressing places on holidays.
