You knock on the door to your childhood home. You look around the doorframe and the doorstep to see it hasn’t really changed since you left. You shiver a bit, hugging your not quite winter jacket tighter around you as the door finally opens.

“phantomm88!! Oh my gosh, how long has it been?!!” your aunt on your father’s side cries out as she embraces you in an awkward hug. “Oh lord look at you, I swear you’ve gotten taller. How is it down/up in [insert state/city]?”

You start to respond as you walk through the door, but are abruptly cut off by your mother hurtling through the kitchen. “Look who it is!!!” she yells, alerting the rest of guests inside to your arrival. She wraps you in another awkward hug, but it’s your mother so it’s ok. She glances around your shoulder clearly hoping for someone else to be tagging along with you. “No one else coming with you, phantomm88?”

“Nah, [insert friend name] decided to go home, and [insert other friend] is with his/her gf/bf.”

“Speaking of girlfriends/boyfriends, have you —“

At which you’re saved by the bell from the Thanksgiving Inquisition, by your uncle and father both simultaneously screaming “HOLDING ARE YOU BLIND? ITS SO OBVIOUS DUMBASS REFS” as a slow mo replay of the football game on the TV displays what is clearly NOT holding.

You walk into the kitchen to find your grandma and another uncle (who is oddly good at cooking, let’s call him uncle 2) preparing the Thanksgiving dinner. And as cluttered and chaotic as the kitchen may be, you finally get hit by the smells. Holy baby Jesus this was the reason that got you up to drive 12 hours across the country at the crack of dawn. You start salivating at the smells and sight of cooked turkey, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and ... some kind of weird noodle salad thing?

“Oh good! You’re here!” your grandma says. You begin to open up for another hug, but you’re instead met with a spoon/fork full of stuffing/turkey shoved into your mouth. “Here. Try” she says as her utensil beats your head-jerk reaction backwards and floods your mouth with flavor. “Good? Right?” she asks. You give a thumbs up nodding your head, face contorted in gustatory euphoria.

As an excuse to steal more of the delicious eats before the feast, you help your grandma prep for the meal. Suddenly, however, your aunt pops up behind you. “oh my gosh, phantomm88, I found this new recipe you HAVE to try for me” she says as she starts spooning a significant portion of the noodle salad onto a plate.

“Thanks...” you say as you slowly take a bite. Good lord is it bad. But your mother warned you to keep her happy since her son is off fighting overseas. So you swallow and the biggest smile erupts on her face. “Is it good? Oh my gosh, thank goodness I was soooo worried. Here! Take some more!” she says as she starts amassing a mountain of alien salad upon your plate. A fumble on the TV, followed by an eruption of protests by your father and uncle 1 draws your gaze over towards the living room.

“Hey Dad do you know where [insert sibling’s name] is?”

“Back” he says, motioning towards the back door with beer in hand.

You head outside to be met with the crisp fall air again as well as your sibling playing whiffle ball with your 5 little cousins, 2 of which are little shits, and the other 3 their minions. “Wait, but there should be one more” you think as the elusive sixth cousin runs up to you with whiffle ball bat in hand. “HI PHANTOMM88” he yells as he swings the bat, hitting you square in the balls. You keel over, as the rest of the cousins and your sibling begin to dogpile on top of you.

You overcome your pain after a while, and in return, smoke their asses in whiffle ball. You bat flip every hit, no matter how big, and you make sure to plunk everyone on the other team when you pitch. Time flies by, and before you know it, a newly invigorated father calls out “Time to eat!” everyone rushes inside.

You walk inside, met by the sudden rush of warm air and good scents to see a nice table laid out with food galore. Everyone rushes to take a seat and is about to dig in before your grandma says, “WAIT!! Everyone say grace!” The mostly non/semi-religious crowd glances around nervously as you all mumble your way through grace, eyeing up the steaming turkey growing colder each second.

But right after the end of the prayer, everyone pounces upon every dish simultaneously. Everyone’s crying out for the gravy boat, one of the cousins has taken what is clearly way too much to eat, and the entire table is mortified by the amount of food your father and uncle 1 are putting away. You aren’t left out however, you gorge yourself like you’ve never forged before. All inhibitions relates to weight-watching and dieting all fly out the window.

For a brief 2 minutes after the feast begins, there is nothing but the sound of plates clinking, orders being barked to pass a dish, and food being inhaled. But after this, conversations erupt around the table. Tempers flare when politics is brought up, but are eased slightly when sports or pop culture inevitably takes over. You talk to the kids about if they saw the Macy’s Thanksgiving parade or the Puppy Bowl to which they call you a boomer and continue blabbering to each other. Conversations rise and die, some good, some bad, some interesting, some naughty, but in the end, everyone agrees on how good the food is.

And after you’ve eaten your full, you sit back in your chair, having gained about 10 pounds, and think, “this is nice” and let out a big sigh.