Almost every year, I find myself hosting Christmas for my large, extended family. Either by my own hand or by my husband generously electing me to the post of party queen, every December plays out like the last. Part of my problem is that I hate uncomfortable silences and when the question of who will be hosting Christmas starts to get thrown around in the months leading up to December, the silence of the response is usually deafening. I find myself twisting uncomfortably in the silence and when I no longer take the cricket-song that I hear through the hollow void of replies, I blurt out my bid for it. This has resulted in me winning 27 out of 27times, uncontested. Tell them what I won Johnny: Announcer voice: You've won five days of cleaning, seven trips to the grocery store, nine hours of cooking, three days of decorating, two trips to the liquor store, a beer run, a trip to the party store and two insanely swollen feet!
Luckily, the same does not hold true with Thanksgiving. My sister-in-law loves to do Thanksgiving and I would go as far as to say that she has a lock on the holiday. Thanksgiving is the one holiday of the year that I can guarantee that I can be a guest and that my feet won't swell and throb like two Smithfield hams at the end of the day. It's a holiday where I get a job or a few jobs and I am joyful in the execution of these jobs. You want a sweet potato casserole? I'm your girl. What's that you say? A Chocolate Cream pie? Why of course and I'll throw in a Lemon Pound Cake for good measure.
This year, I was so blissful in my guesting duties that I made a pie, a cake, the Serious Eats Hassleback Potato Gratin (you MUST! Really!) and I had energy leftover to throw together a spur of the moment cranberry sauce. It's easy to be a sport when you haven't been washing floors, scrubbing toilets, vacuuming, dusting and pulling the gizzards out of the ass-end of a giant bird for the last 48 hours.
The burden of hosting is something that is not completely understood by my husband, who seems to think that hosting consists of making a beer run and having the freedom to start cocktail hour earlier than would be socially acceptable on any other day of the year. Every year he looks at me on the morning after a Christmas soiree in almost complete confusion, as I sit with my feet up, on the verge of tears, with a combination of bewilderment and exhaustion on my face over having survived the hosting of another family Christmas celebration. Every year, it pushes me to the brink and every year (like the definition of insanity), I do it again, expecting a different result. The need for change is clearly on me.
So this year, I will wait in discomfort for someone to throw their Santa hat into the ring. I am not going to volunteer, no matter how deafening the silence becomes. I will duct tape my own mouth closed, if need be. I will be resolute in my decision to stand down. But...you might want to check my feet on December 26th. If they are spilling out of my shoes and pulsating like a defective neon sign, then my resolution wasn't worth the Christmas wrapping it was written on.
March 17 2019 P.S. - I did not cave. Man, my feet feel good!
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