It’s now October, which means it’s almost November, which means the holidays are fast approaching. As in you’d better start getting your holiday shopping lists together. As in you’d better starting figuring out who’s making what for Thanksgiving.
I have a small immediate family (shout out to all the only children in the house!) but a huge extended family with a bunch of cousins and aunts and uncles. Although we’re never sure whose house we’re going to for which holiday, there is one thing we can always count on: politics will most certainly be discussed at least a dozen times. And it won’t always be pretty.
My dad and uncle have way different political views than a lot of the rest of my family. And they aren’t afraid to voice their loud (and sometimes lousy) opinions about everything from Charlottesville to universal healthcare. For example, Yom Kippur dinner kicked off with my dad and I shouting at each other about NFL players taking a knee, followed by some truly alternative facts from him, and culminating in me running out of the room crying. That was followed by several sleepless nights playing back the conversation in my head, coming up with several retorts I wished I’d thought of in the moment.
I don’t want to go through that again as the holiday marathon approaches, so I’ve been racking my brain for some moves I can make when things start to get ugly. Because he is my dad, and my parents and I are close (see above, the only child thing), not seeing him or speaking to him anymore is off the table. So that leaves me with a few alternative solutions (different from alternative facts), which I thought might be helpful to those of you also facing down a long dark slog of holiday political conversations.
What do you think? How do you deal with politics at the holiday dinner table? Do you have any survival tips for the rest of us? Sound off in the comments below.
Image CreditWild Whim Design + Photography
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