Thanks-taking.

Thank:  To give one's thanks to; express appreciation or gratitude to.


I don't know where I got my ideas about what Thanksgiving is supposed to be like.  Probably from a magazine or a schmaltzy movie I've seen.  Maybe its an elaborate reconstruct from a bad acid trip.  I don't think it's a very accurate picture.  I don't think very many people have a Thanksgiving celebration that corresponds to my mental image.  I don't know very many, I'll tell you that, and I didn't have very many of them myself.  And I don't think that alcoholics as a general rule have families that are that much better or that much worse than most people.  We just bitch about them more.


Expectations are the bane of normal men and they can be a deadly curse for the drunk.  I embrace the idea that as my expectations increase my serenity drops, and vice versa.  To complicate things there can't be many times when my expectations grow more monstrous, more gruesome, more larger than life than around the holidays.  The idea that we need to dedicate a day to be thankful makes it sound like we're given a pass to act like asses all year long, then we're expected to cram all of our gratitude into one day.  I think this isn't as unusual as it sounds for many people.  Ignore the small blessings and then get together with people we don't treat very well or don't like very much and be totally fucking thankful.


I was in a small company once where the boss -- who I disliked immensely -- made everyone exchange names for Christmas gifts.  He got my name one year, of course.
"What do you want for Christmas?" he asked.  "Give me some ideas."
"How about you don't act like such an asshole?" I suggested.
He didn't have much to say to that, although his face reddened considerably, like a nice glaze on a Christmas ham.
"No good?"  I said, pressing my point.  "How about you leave me alone for the rest of the year?  How about you take this scrap of paper with my name on it and stick it where the sun don't shine?  


I didn't say those things.  I wanted to.  I also wanted to keep my job and vaguely remembered some crap about "restraint of tongue and pen."  The point is that it did feel very unnatural to try to manufacture good will and hale cheer like a trained seal.  If I can't be happy and grateful, sometimes, every now and then, once a week or so, then I really shouldn't attend special celebrations dedicated to the topic.


I really wish that there were White Castle restaurants in the New City.  That would be a good place to celebrate Thanksgiving.