maarmie's musings

Saturday, November 24, 2012

Happy Thanksgiving?

I didn't really do much for Thanksgiving this year. Last year, I did the whole turkey, mashed potato, cornbread thing with a few added British extras like roasted carrots and potatoes and Yorkshire puddings. The menu this year included baked salmon and rice. Not exciting, but nice, nonetheless.

Tomorrow, Elliot and I are going to Simpson's Garden Centre to meet a few other fellow Americans for lunch as a belated Thanksgiving event. Santa Claus is touching down in a helicopter around half 10, so I said we'd be there around 11 or half past.

What? Doesn't Elliot want to see Santa arrive in his chopper? No. I already told her Santa doesn't exist. Doesn't exist, you say? But, of course he does! He's the physical embodiment of charity and giving and blah, blah, blah. Hm. Don't think so.

I don't know why everyone protects the "existence" of Santa Claus as if it were some kind of worldwide imperative and why people get so upset to hear that a parent has told her child that Santa doesn't exist. It's not like I told her that monsters hide under her bed and are waiting for her to go to sleep so they can rip out her throat and play volleyball with her still-beating heart. Oh, wait. I did that, too. My bad!

I'm a shitty mum.

I'm horrible.

No...really.

Seriously, people are so protective of the Santa lie. The only thing I can think of is they feel horribly guilty for propagating the bullshit all the while trampling over the dignity of their children and taking advantage of their children's trust. They never bothered to figure out that this is, in fact, what they are doing by admonishing their children to believe in fictional characters in the first place. I swear to Christ, some people are just so used to parenting in a sheeplike fashion, no thought at all put into it. Well, MY parents did it and THEIR parents did it and my UNCLES did it to their kids, they say, so I do it to mine!

Fine. You go ahead and lie to them and rape and pillage their trust. It's up to you what you do with and to your kid. I'm not telling you not to. But the way I see it, you made the mistake. Get over it. I didn't. Get over that, too. I haven't derided you for your decision (until now), so leave me the fuck alone about mine.

In other news, as of 4:30 pm eastern standard time yesterday, the parents still hadn't bothered returning my brother's phone call from the day before asking if they were doing anything with grandma for Thanksgiving. In recent years, the parents and brother and sister-in-law would make the annual pilgrimage to Cracker Barrel, grandma's favourite restaurant, for some good Turkey Day fun. Brian wanted to know if they were doing it again this year. My parents didn't call back Wednesday. And, upon checking all his various phones in the time between visiting in-laws and visiting biomom's side of the family, he found that they had not phoned him back yet as of 4:30 on Thanksgiving Day. I'm wondering if they ever ended up contacting him at all.

Update: As of 5 p.m. on Nov. 29, the parents still have not called my brother back about getting together on Thanksgiving. This is all the more rude and insulting considering that my brother went to their house a few weeks ago and helped them set up some sort of GPS system. I think it's really fucking disgusting that they continue calling him to help them with all sorts of technical problems (mobile phone, computer, GPS) and they don't treat him with much dignity or respect beyond that. And when he does finally talk to them, it seems like stepmom blames HIM for their lack of communication. They really are warped in every possible way. I hope they aren't surprised if he decides not to take care of them in their old age. But he probably will - no matter how they treat him. He's the good son. And that's what good sons do.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Happy Thanksgiving Julie xx