There is nothing better than getting together with your estranged family, accidentally finding your single aunt crying in the bathroom about her last boyfriend and then taking a bite out of the world’s driest piece of turkey. Oh sorry, I meant nothing worse could happen. Everybody loves a good holiday, I mean there’s tons of food and sparkly decor. However, Thanksgiving isn’t a holiday, it’s a trap set up by big businesses to ensure that when Black Friday comes around, the normal American citizen is too stuffed with tryptophan from the turkey that Aunt Martha burnt.

   Since the fateful day where the Native Americans and Pilgrims traded food and secrets, Thanksgiving has been a staple in American culture. Even if we choose to breeze over the morbid backstory of Thanksgiving there are still plenty of reasons why the Holiday is more of a circus than Cirque du Soleil.

   Let’s take a minute to think about the actual act of celebrating Thanksgiving. Every single one of my aunts and uncles come around. I bump into several of the walking dead, who then proceed to gush about how big and beautiful I’ve become and essentially bore my brains out. At this point we are lead into the elegant dining room that grandma spent all morning setting up. Chairs scrape the ground and a there is a surrounding sound of shuffling as people sit down. There’s mashed potatoes drowning in gravy, cranberry sauce that’s an unhealthy shade of red and a roasted turkey set as the centerpiece.

   Without skipping a beat, people begin the ritual of passing food. So maybe some of Grandma’s food finds its way onto every clean surface, and maybe my younger cousins are flinging peas everywhere, but that’s not even the worst part. The whole night has a cloud hanging over it. Who is going to break the thin veil of calm that is only being held together at the seams? Will it be my aunt who starts asking questions about whether or not I have a boyfriend? Or my bratty cousin who “accidently” spills the gravy boat on to his little sister?

   Maybe your family is better or maybe you’re just blind to how uncomfortable Thanksgiving is. You can happily celebrate the holiday but don’t ask me to be grateful when this is nothing more than the excuse people use to stuff their face and spend a small fortune on material needs.