What could be more comforting than Thanksgiving dinner shared with extended family members? (Okay, hold the snickering—I mean, aside from the occasional personality clashes and unavoidable family tiffs.)
We gather together on this traditional holiday to express our thanks for the bounty we have received throughout the year. And judging by the mountain of food piled on the table, which literally groans under the sheer weight of it all—for most of us it’s a sign of more than plenty.
But the scariest part about this holiday is the fact that the weight of that food is about to be transferred from the table to everyone surrounding it. After all, Thanksgiving spelled backwards is “gluttony”—at least metaphorically speaking. But it doesn’t matter whether you spell it upside down, inside out or backwards, the bottom line is that on this “holy day of food worshipping”, it seems that we grant ourselves a free pass to scarf down everything in sight. What’s up with that?
Statistics show that the average person consumes roughly 6,000 calories on Thanksgiving Day—nearly three times the amount we eat on any regular day. What causes us to turn into human vacuum cleaners this one day of the year? I suspect that it involves the same reasoning as the famous “mountain climbing” quote.
“Why did you climb Mount Everest?”
“Because it was there.”
“Why did you eat five pounds of turkey, a dozen dinner rolls and two pumpkin pies?”
“Because they were there.”
We simply have no willpower when tasty homemade food is placed within our grasp. Then we spend the rest of the day in a comatose state sitting in front of the television.
I guess it really doesn’t matter, since there’s absolutely no way we could burn off that many calories. It would take 12 hours of non-stop jogging or 24 hours of walking. And that is SO not going to happen. You can just stuff that exercise nonsense right up the turkey where it belongs! This is a holiday!
Year after year we indulge ourselves in at least one serving of each and every one of the twenty-eight or more offerings from the Thanksgiving Day spread, and then, when we’re about to explode, the hostess offers dessert.
“Do you want pecan pie, apple pie, or pumpkin pie?” she asks.
“Sure,” we reply. Why pick just one when we can have all three?
I guess we’ll never know why we lose all sense of reason on this special day. I believe it must have its roots somewhere in our early evolution, tied to Cro-Magnon Man’s fear of famine—or we just plain have no will power when our senses are overloaded with so much taste-tempting, mouth-watering, aromatic, delectable treats. Yep, that’s probably it.
And we’re darn thankful to have them, too. Bring on the turkey! Could you pass the sweet potatoes again, please?
