I’m Not Thankful For Thanksgiving

I'm getting nauseous just looking at this spread...

Unlike the rest of the world, Thanksgiving is my least-favorite holiday. I know, I know—the food, the laziness, the time off from work, the family (well . . . maybe that’s not such a plus)—what’s not to love?

By Carly

For starters, I am a near vegetarian (I say “near” only because I will eat meat if other people prepare it for me) and I just plain dislike the taste of meat. So while the turkey is the main event for almost everyone I know, it kind of makes me wrinkle my nose. No, thank you.

I’m not above tolerating a meal I don’t like for one day out of the year, but the smell of Thanksgiving food cooking actually makes me feel slightly nauseous. This isn’t just because of the turkey—it’s a long story. (Warning: If you are of the weak stomach, I’d recommend you stop reading now.)

In seventh grade, my family hosted an exchange student from Germany for a couple of weeks in the fall, and we thought it would be fun to make a “practice” Thanksgiving dinner to share with her while she was there so she could experience a new holiday.

I was psyched because I loved Thanksgiving food at the time, and even though my stomach felt a little funny early in the day, I ignored it so I could eat as much of my dad’s delicious Thanksgiving food as possible. This, it turned out, was a terrible mistake. My stomach started feeling worse and worse as the day wore on, and finally I decided to try to down some Pepto-Bismol. I managed to only taste it before my stomach had had enough and proceeded to empty its entire contents… all over the dining-room table. I can’t even explain how traumatizing this was. It’s bad enough to get sick in a place where you don’t have to stare at everything you ate earlier, but to have everyone see what you ate earlier, well, it was quite distressing.

I was really sick for a couple of days, and ever since then, the appeal of Thanksgiving has just been lost to me. I try to hide in my room when the aromas of stuffed turkey, gravy, potatoes, and cranberries drift nearby, but even a stray whiff makes me feel ill. So for the last few years, I’ve just tried to avoid Thanksgiving altogether—a couple of years ago, I went camping with my boyfriend over Thanksgiving weekend, and the following year we prepared a lamb biryani Indian dish. This year, I’m thankfully dating a vegetarian, so he also has no interest in the traditional Thanksgiving spread. We plan to make roasted-vegetable lasagna, and for that, I truly can feel thankful.