With Covid taking a victory lap around the country, it seems everyone’s holiday plans are up in the air. Well, not mine. Social distance Thanksgiving, Zoom Thanksgiving, no Thanksgiving at all, it doesn’t matter to me. All that really matters is that I get to kill this fucking bird.
Sure, Thanksgiving is about family, bonds, and appreciating what you have. It’s also about control. Control over the life and death of another living, breathing creature. It is about cosmic justice. About being God. It is placing the neck of a behemoth bird on your chopping block and saying, “You have grown fat off of my table scraps long enough you flightless waste of space. I deem you unworthy and it is time to die.”
And, like, pie or whatever.
I for one need the control. Without the rush of killing a living thing and feasting off of its remains once a year, I fear what I will become. When I drop this ax I’m not just chopping the head off some dumb bird. I’m chopping the head off of everyone who has ever wronged me. I’m chopping my boss. I’m chopping my kids when they don’t listen. I am channeling a year’s worth of pent up rage and hatred into a single act of murder and, instead of going to prison, I will be told it is delicious.
I warn you: do not take this from me.
It really doesn’t matter if the family decides to brave the trip or not, that bird will fall to my blade. I don’t care if it “doesn’t make sense to cook such a large turkey for just the four of us.” Why don’t I just go buy a smaller bird as my husband suggested? Because that isn’t part of the ritual. And if I do not get my ritual, that bastard will be the first to know.
No, it has to be THIS turkey. The one I’ve fed and cared for and fattened all year, knowing all the while it’s gruesome fate. Every night I come to the coop with my handful of corn. I stare into the bird’s impossibly vacant eyes and I think about every regret I’ve ever had. Then I scatter the corn, watching this pathetic evolutionary throwback peck at my charity, kernel by kernel, as I tell myself, “Soon. Soon.”
Plus, I really want to try this butterfly-cut method I read about. Apparently, it cooks faster and retains more moisture. Win-win!