Tyranny of the Turkey
I am very sleepy today. Really, just worn out. It�s that sleep-deprivation feeling I know well from baby times but is not caused by waking babies or waking anything.
It�s just that time of year. It�s one of the reasons I have an unreasonable mild hate for this upcoming holiday. It�s not the holiday itself � the whole �be thankful� thing. I think, especially for this country and its greedy capitalistic inhabitants, that message is a good one.
But it always hits at the time of year when illness strikes. And even when nobody�s actually sick, I never feel 100%. Ever. I just want to crawl into my covers and stay there for a week. Maybe longer.
Most of my issues with Thanksgiving are interwoven with my complex relationship with my mother and I don�t really have the mental powers needed to tackle that particular problem right now. I have problems with a large meal being the center piece of the holiday. I won�t go into that right now much either. It is also complex and not only involves the �tradition of sickness� but also my own personal stress-related issues with food and my stomach. And I imagine that anyone who�s ever suffered food-related issues may find this particular holiday...troublesome as well.
I also hate what I call Tyranny of the Turkey � how the whole meal revolves around this giant bird. Our mealtime used to be inflexibly at 2:00pm. Which is insane. It�s too late for lunch, too early for dinner, and my stomach can�t take it. It can�t take large amounts of food in the middle of the day and it has a lot of trouble with meals that are not eaten at normal mealtimes. Why has the meal traditionally been at 2:00? Because that�s when the turkey�s finished. Utter ridiculousness. Now that I do not eat meat (and haven�t since 1988), I have much less patience for this crap.
Plus, children cannot wait that long for a meal. Mine are usually eating lunch by 11:00am. And then again at noon and 1:00pm. So, a meal this late in the day is really a snack for them. Sigh. And I said I wasn�t going to go into it.
Fortunately, we�ve been able to move the meal time earlier recently which helps. But still. I would much rather do a dinnertime thing, something less fancy � no china plates or silver utensils � and just make it into something more akin to a party. If only I was a football fan or something - there'd be that something extra to look forward to. But I hate football more than I hate turkey, which is saying something.
Probably if I had a larger family with many siblings and cousins and aunts and uncles � people I liked to see and rarely did, the holiday would have a different feel to it. But, I�ve only once had Thanksgiving with my dad and stepmother. And that was before my younger sisters were born. We went to West Virginia. It was a terrible experience.
I deeply heart the sisters that I do have - and my talented brother-in-law - but I rarely ever see my two younger sisters. I always enjoy the company of my sister, Amblus, of course. But we don't need Thanksgiving as an excuse to get together.
I have one aunt, one uncle, two cousins (my father is an only child; as is my husband). They live in California. I love to see them (and did back in April) but we�ve never done Thanksgiving together. So our meals are the usual suspects and a friend of my mother�s who I�ve grown to like over the years even though her selfishness knows no bounds. At least she�s a cat person rather than, say, a Pomeranian breeder or something. I don�t get dog people.
My in-laws will be coming into town on Friday. Dusty will get early birthday presents. I like my in-laws though there aren't many things to talk to them about. They enjoy their grandchildren and the kids enjoy them back so these days I can sit back and relax a bit. But they never come down for Thanksgiving - they don't like to travel on the interstates during the rushes and who can blame them?
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Okay � entirely different topic: my new obsession. So, last week The Amazing Violet sent me a package. Inside were the contents of her drawer (though, not anymore since I own them, duh). The contents included two decks of tarot cards.
I was never much into tarot cards when I was younger. It was interesting but it seemed way too complicated to even bother figuring out with my puny pea brain, like chess. Learn to play chess with the 50 billion different ways any one piece can move? Forget about it. Give me something I can handle like checkers or dominos. Thus was my thinking about tarot cards. But, I love fortune telling and the like so when I opened the box and saw the decks there, I had to know more.
So, I am printing off �lessons� in tarot reading from the Internet. It�s fascinating stuff. A lot of fun and, yes, very complex. Cards mean something when standing alone but, when paired with another, the meaning can be a bit different. And then you bring your own interpretation to it as well. It�s nice to have a little project, a little diversion right now.
Because otherwise, I�d fall asleep at my desk and I have to work tomorrow. Come by and say hello so I don�t slip into a coma over here, �k?
