Tradition . . . Tradition!

Holidays are always wrapped up in traditions . . . all the things that your particular family does and eats during a particular time of year. Thanksgiving is a great example of this, in that everyone has things that they HAVE TO HAVE for the holiday to seem meaningful for them. Have to have macaroni and cheese. Have to have cranberry sauce from the can. Have to have pumpkin pie. Have to have sweet potatoes. Now, “have to have” may be a slight exaggeration, but if we don’t have these things we get pretty disappointed. Why is that?

Is it because when we are around our families, we sort of want to keep that continuity going . . . the unbroken chain of canned cranberry sauce going through the years?

Every year, Mr. Random and I go to my parents’ house for Thanksgiving dinner. They live less than 30 miles away and they have a big enough house, and there are usually other family members there so they are going to be cooking anyway. However, one year my youngest sister’s marching band got into the Macy’s parade. Mr. Random and I were so excited because that meant that my parents would be going to New York to see her on that day. Thanksgiving by ourselves! We can do whatever we want! We can stay home in our PJ’s! Yay!

But of course, this was in 2001. And then September 11 happened. And then my parents got weird about going, even though my sister still was going to do it. So my parents didn’t go, and they had Thanksgiving at their house, and Mr. Random and I went, like the dutiful folks we are. I was ultimately quite bummed, but pulled through.

Thanksgiving dinner holds no joy for me . . . the whole ritual seems rather forced. When I was little, our family would go to my father’s parents’ house, where because he was one of more than 10 siblings, there were lots and lots of uncles and aunts and cousins there. I always hated the crowds and the noise and the paper plate that always ended up falling into my lap . . . I always wanted to just sit quietly in a corner with a book and be left alone. When my family moved down here, we started having Thanksgiving at home, which always seemed random and odd, because instead of eating in the kitchen, like we did every other day of the year, we moved into the dining room with the good plates. The dynamic changed . . . usually we would eat dinner watching TV and making random funny comments about the news or Jeopardy or Wheel of Fortune, or whatever random TV show was on. But now we were suck in this oddly formal room, in the stiff chairs and dressed up . . . and it just felt wrong . . . feels wrong . . .

I guess I am an informal person at heart – I hate stuffy ceremony, just for ceremony’s sake. I am afraid that if I had Thanksgiving at our condo, there would be all of these expectations . . . we must sit around our cramped little dining table and have turkey and stuffing and blah, blah, blah . . . and I would be freaked out and hate it, and everyone else would be uncomfortable and hate it.

However, if I just did my usual easy, breezy entertaining style – buffet on the table, random yummy side dishes that may or may not have anything to do with Thanksgiving, no turkey, everyone sit wherever with your plate and just hang out – people would be like, “What the . . .?”

Or they might really like it. I don’t know . . .

But holidays are so fraught with the baggage of tradition . . . it’s so hard to let those expectations go . . . but sometimes you want to make up your own traditions, but feel stifled, like you are going to let the universe down in some way . . .

I guess, part of growing up is eventually making that break - ultimately YOU will be happier forging your own path and doing things that will be meaningful to you. And once you do that, you actually will be carrying on the tradition of the true reason for the holiday, whatever the holiday may be . . .

Because holidays are ultimately about spending time with the people you care about the most and enjoying each other’s presence for the short time we all have on this earth. Not freaking out about turkeys and pies and the good china and centerpieces . . . just loving each other and being happy just being together . . .

That’s one tradition I’ll happily pass down to future generations . . .