By Mark Young

mark.young@manateeherald.com

Yeah, yeah, I get it. You didn’t even want to visit today considering it’s a day of turkey, family, football … and for some … political arguments around the table because your liberal relative is in town.

Fortunately you also had a couple of days to visit with me before I come knocking again on Monday so if you are catching this after Thanksgiving Day, I hope you are on the road to recovering from it all.

For the record, if you actually did show up for our visit on Thanksgiving Day, thank you. The holiday season is a tough time to get people around a table like this one so know you are appreciated.

I’ve been in journalism for too long not to have seen the interest in any kind of news to drop off dramatically this time of year. I get it if you end up showing up later.

Most understandably want a break from it all, or as Gov. Ron DeSantis said, “Chill out,” for a hot minute with the political talk. So as we coast through to Christmas, we’ll try to keep these visits more on the light side.

We’ll try to celebrate more things like CBS news doing such a fine job – two years and two elections later – telling America that their fine reporting has revealed that the Hunter Biden laptop is real.

Amazing journalism. Wow.

But fair warning, my Thanksgiving trip through history isn’t exactly uplifting, but I’m OK with laughing at it now. It’s all just part of life. If you don’t laugh at it all, you cry and do I look like the kind of guy who cries? I think not.

The fake NY Times recently did a piece that political fighting at Thanksgiving is a myth. Well that’s ironic since most of what the Times does is mythical so don’t be surprised to learn that what the Times reported is not completely accurate.

True, not all Thanksgivings are a political family brewhaha, but if you’ve done enough of them, then you’ve seen at least one real political battle break out, and I’m sure you all have a story or two. If not, you will eventually.

Our daughter, who has one of the biggest hearts and brightest souls that I have ever seen, unfortunately found herself in a relationship with a raging liberal a few years ago.

You can imagine my dismay. I don’t blame her. She’s the type that loves all living things and will feed the stray dog even when it’s trying to bite her.

As you can imagine, her beau and I had more than a few go arounds while they were together. He is your typical liberal who refuses to listen to facts and believes the liberal media lies. In short, he’s an idiot.

But for some odd reason, the daughter really liked the guy. So it was my duty to get along to keep the peace as best I could. No easy task, believe me.

In fact, now that I mention it, I never really got enough credit for my heroic attempts to make him feel welcome even if those attempts to say welcome were drenched in sarcasm.

Ever watch “All in the family?” Yeah, well this guy was my very own personal Meathead.

A couple of years ago, our dislike for one another was at an all time high, so the ladies made both of us swear separately that there would be absolutely no political talk at Thanksgiving. We both agreed, but we both didn’t keep that promise.

He waited until we were well feasted and feeling no pain from the day’s festivities, so to speak. He also waited until everyone else grabbed the plates and headed to the kitchen before he decided to berate Trump to me.

It came out of nowhere because the conversation was nowhere near the political realm. When I turned to look at him and asked, “What did you just say to me?” he smirked.

I knew right away he was baiting me into a trap. I knew it, but jumped in anyway.

Long story short, after the argument turned loud enough to gain the attention of those inside, that entire Thanksgiving got dumped into the proverbial fryer.

I, of course, got blamed, which did not sit well with me. I tried to explain to the family that I wasn’t the one that brought it up and that this hipster liberal lying loser had planned the whole thing out and was just waiting to spring his trap.

It’s why he waited until everyone else was out of earshot to make his ridiculous comment.

It took several months before the family finally saw what I saw in him and they eventually knew I was telling the truth. It was vindication, but it didn’t save that particular Thanksgiving.

If you are curious, he was arguing with me that Trump had illegally withheld funding that Congress had designated to Ukraine. He pulled up stories from the Times and Washington Post to prove his case.

I tried to tell him that, no, Trump met the deadline to provide the funding. I tried to tell him that all Trump said was don’t pay it right now until he could get a feel for the new president of Ukraine … which of course leads to the perfect phone call.

So I acknowledged that Trump didn’t give the money right away, to which he accused me of, “So you admit that he withheld the money.”

Now at this point, I will admit that I started to come across the table at him. But to my credit, I didn’t. I stopped myself from giving him the ass whooping he deserved.

Not for being a liberal idiot, mind you. He deserved one because he was setting me up to argue with him and I would be the one blamed.

And he was right for a while.

Anyway, it was a typical political showdown with a liberal who doesn’t understand facts and I may – or may not – have unleashed a barrage of curse words while questioning his illogical and factless argument.

Long story short, he was finally exposed as the lying piece of liberal dufus dung that he is and my family finally understood why I felt the way I did about him.

In a few days, the daughter will be bringing home a new beau who is currently serving our nation and from what I understand, is at least largely aligned with myself at the political level.

I’m excited to meet him.

But there are plenty of other things that destroy Thanksgiving besides politics. In reality, when you bring family and friends together, the match is already lit. The only question remains is who will lower the match to the fuse.

Even though most of my Thanksgivings have been just fine, it’s amazing now to me as I get older that most don’t boil over.

The doozy of them all was about 12 or 13 years ago now and certainly wasn’t political.

It was that Thanksgiving Day when my ex decided to tell me that she didn’t love me anymore and was moving on.

We had had a good marriage – or so I thought – and it came as a complete surprise to me. Of course, I learned a lot in the following months that I was not aware of at the time so it is what it is, and I’m better off for it.

But if you’ve been through a significant breakup, then you know it takes time. Thanksgiving had always been my favorite holiday but the next few were a bit rough. I think she chose Thanksgiving to tell me because she knew how much I loved the holiday.

Lordy was I blindsided but what does not kill you only makes you stronger. Yeah, she was that evil.

Up until then, all of my Thanksgivings were either great or decent. Even the few I spent in the military, which makes the holidays tough, are still doable when surrounded with your military brothers.

Anyway, after what I refer to now as the first episode of the “Ex Files,” I skipped the next few Thanksgivings altogether. Then I just volunteered to take the Thanksgiving Day shift at the Bradenton Herald for most of my time there.

The daughter’s liberal nutcase incident was one of the first Thanksgivings I had wanted to do in many years. It was a crap show of epic proportions, too, but redemption was eventually mine and I was ready to do another.

Hopes were high because the liberal was no longer in the picture. I should note that there are no liberals in our family so his brief entry into my holiday family life was thankfully fleeting.

But the next Thanksgiving got destroyed thanks to a crazy family friend on their side who decided to dredge up some very sensitive family history. The ensuing argument – which did not have anything to do with me this time – was intense and I was asked to do something I’ve never done before, which is to throw someone out of our home.

Here’s where I try to take the high road and not mention the fact that I was 100% on my family’s side. I didn’t blame them for a second and immediately had their backs, unlike what happened the previous Thanksgiving. But I’m too big of a person to bring that up so I won’t.

So this year, there is no work involved and there is no family coming. We are breaking away from tradition this year and have a great day planned.

As I write this, I have a couple of grass fed ribeye steaks marinating. I have a huge platter of shrimp ready to go and it will be a quiet day of football, good food and the only company I need.

That my friends, is what I call a good Thanksgiving and I’m thankful for it.

So I get it. We’ll take a small break from politics for the most part and let’s get through this holiday season with some cheer and hope for the future.

You all know how I like to end our visits, but this time I’ll just say that I am wishing each and everyone of you a very happy Thanksgiving.

I am so thankful for our visits. I am so thankful for you. Please keep sharing our visits with your like-minded – or not so like minded – friends and family. Share the love, the humor and the facts. Enjoy!