U.S. Thanksgiving Post-Mortem
One thing to which I do not believe I will ever grow accustomed is Canadian Thanksgiving - it’s in October, on the US Columbus Day. Weirdness. It just seems six kinds of screwy to me.
Anyway, as a result, Tre, the kids, and I all celebrated Thanksgiving last month, so there wasn’t a whole lot to do yesterday. Instead of gorging on turkey and stuffing, we were out trying to get a head start on some of our Christmas shopping. On the way home, we picked up the second of two giant parcels sent from the US by my grandmother.
Sooooo, I figured the best thing I could do was call her, say thank you, and wish her a happy holiday. First, like an airhead, I called her work - completely forgetting everyone would be off for Thanksgiving. Then, I called her sister’s house…. talked to my great-aunt for a while, which was nice. I haven’t talked to her in a long time, and her health is terrible… no telling how much longer I’ll be able to talk to her whenever the urge strikes. (Note to self: Call Aunt Linda more often, international rates be damned.) My grandmother wasn’t there, but my great-aunt suggested she might be visiting with my uncle at my folks’ house (my uncle has been living in their basement for something like three or four years now).
So I called over to my parents’ house, desperately hoping my dad or one of my siblings would answer the phone. Instead, the phone was answered by the creature who spit me out of her fouler regions almost 27 years ago. Phone conversations with this woman never fail to induce the need to chain-smoke, so I always try to keep them as concise as possible, so they end expediently. It started simply enough, with me saying happy Thanksgiving, ascertaining my grandmother’s absence from the premises, and then making a polite brief inquiry into the well-being of other family members. This promptly took us into a conversation about my little brother attempting to enlist in the US Navy - apparently he attends his first MEPS next week. Suddenly, I started getting an ear full about how Iraqis and Muslims in general deserve everything they get from the US because “they did wrong by us first”, how almost all Americans killed or tortured overseas in the past two years have been victims of Muslims, how all Muslims cheer for the beheadings of Americans, how Muslims are all ungrateful for the “help” the US tries to provide, how no Muslims killed in Afghanistan or Iraq were innocent civilians - instead they are ALL terrorists and militants.
When I tried to turn this around and explain that perhaps Muslims in general did not attack the US (terrorists did), that not all Muslims - or even the majority - are terrorists, that maybe we are now harming more than we are helping, that, yes, there have been thousands of truly civilian Muslim casualties (the number of which far outweigh US casualties, military or otherwise)… I was informed that I was ignorant, bigoted, and brainwashed.
I’m the bigoted one? For pointing out perhaps her view is just a wee bit skewed in a prejudicial manner? For mentioning perhaps there is wrong occurring on both sides, and that a US WASP-dominated government might actually have made a few mistakes at this point? How the hell am I the bigoted one?
I was so spitting angry with this woman, I hung up in the middle of her usual tactic of yelling endlessly and dogmatically about whatever opinion she holds most recently (usually with little regard to whether there might be a few more sides to the story). I had to take a few minutes to calm down, and stop bawling. The woman is first class at upsetting me, and - like any good assassin - knows there are few better times to go in for the kill than when I try to do something peaceable and family-ish on a holiday. I swear she thrives on the familial hostility she invokes, not only in myself but also in other kin.
After a few minutes, I called back with the specific purpose in mind of getting my dad on the phone for a quick “Happy Thanksgiving”, so I could at least feel my daughterly duties had been fulfilled. Mom answered again, and when I asked to speak to dad, promptly commenced an attempt to shred me a new one… except this time I cut her off: “I didn’t call back to speak to you. I called back to wish Dad a happy Thanksgiving. May I speak with him, please?”
This resulted in the answer: “I thought he was upstairs, but I just banged on the ceiling and didn’t get an answer, so he might be outside checking those failed brake lines on the Volvo. I’m not getting up to find him so that he can talk to you.”
“Well, when you see him, please tell him and the kids I said happy Thanksgiving. If and when you see your mother, tell her the same and that I will try to call her tomorrow.”
“Fine, but you can’t sit there and tell me…”
“Good-bye” CLICK.
Yep, folks, for me that’s a holiday phone call home. And she wonders why I rarely call, and why it’s even rarer for me to speak with her when I do. Last year when I called to wish her a happy Mother’s Day, she managed to get us into a discussion on genetics, and informed me very huffily that I must be a Nazi supporter because I was capable of defining “eugenics” and “genocide” and explaining that they did not mean the same thing (one is a legitimate branch of medical science, the other is wholesale extermination of a demographic). Actual visits are far worse - a few years back, her Thanksgiving trick was to sit in the middle of an extended family dinner, in front of mine and others’ children and my then-husband, and go on about exactly what kind of whore she thought I was. Then, I heard later, she became angry when people criticized her for doing so, after my spouse and I excused ourselves and left early. Visits home mean heavy use of my prescription anti-anxiolytics… I literally have to be medicated with sedatives to spend more than a few hours around the woman. And, as of this past June, I am now under physician orders to avoid contact with the woman, to preserve my own psychological health.
Life with my mother all comes back down to the old adage about how misery loves company.
Soooooo…..
Today is the day after US Thanksgiving. In the frigid, glistening light of a Canadian winter morning, I have the time and space to reflect, to think about where I went wrong, to autopsize my holiday actions.
What have I learned?
- Remember almost everyone is off work in the US on major holidays like Thanksgiving. This means my grandmother cannot be reached at work, and my mother will most likely be home if I call my parents’ house.
- Don’t bother calling my parents’ house, even if I’m looking for my grandmother. Instead, email my dad and siblings a holiday e-card or some such. (Thank the Holy Bubba for email!)
- My mother continues to become more and more like her grandmother with each passing year, whether she admits it or not. Therefore, since she is following in that particular set of footsteps, it is particularly counter-productive to make any attempts at rational debate, mediation, or balanced discourse with her. Don’t bother.
- If I must call, I should probably smoke a cigarette first.
Mind you, the idea was never to convince her she was wrong, or that I was right. The idea was to point out maybe things aren’t as black-and-white, all-or-nothing as she perceives them. And the original point was just to call, wish everyone a happy holiday, and hopefully talk to my grandmother. Nothing more, nothing less.
Tears dried. Post-mortem concluded. Lessons learned. I won’t make the same mistake twice.
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