Fire the Turkey and Make Tacos Instead For Thanksgiving

How to define your day of gratitude

The Thanksgiving dinner torture begins.

Cooking and hosting the perfect dinner. Family you’re supposed to love because you share DNA. The grocery bill that could fund a small vacation.

All that work transforming what should be a celebration into an exhausting performance you’ll spend the weekend recovering from.

This is society’s answer for gratitude.

We spend hundreds on a single meal, then hours cooking it. We follow it up with Black Friday chaos, spend the weekend eating leftovers nobody wants, and return to work Monday already dreading December.

Simple.

I spent most of my life trapped in this pattern—from childhood into my 30s.

Going through motions because that’s what you do on Thanksgiving. Never once asking if this actually made me feel grateful.

—————

The Kitchen Memory

I never had to cook the big turkey for my family.

We always brought sides—green bean casserole, sweet potato pie, rolls that came from a can. The whole meal didn’t fall to one person, which was something.

My best Thanksgiving memories happened when I was 7 to 11 years old.

My family followed the patriarchal script—women prepare the meal while men sit and watch TV. My mom would get up early and start cooking the turkey. She was cooking for about 20 people most Thanksgivings.

We rotated houses so the same person wouldn’t have to host year after year.

Somehow the women still did all the work regardless of whose house we were in.

Sitting in the kitchen with the women while they worked on dinner was amazing.

We had three generations present. It was casual talk, mostly about what was going on in their lives. My grandmother’s stories. My mom orchestrating everything. My aunts offering advice and gossip.

The sound of women’s voices rising and falling with laughter punctuating the chopping and stirring. I didn’t always like everyone in the room, but we were bonding.

The turkey was just the excuse.

The real feast was connection.

Those mornings in the kitchen taught me more about being human than the actual dinner ever did.

—————

The Slow Fade

But naturally, as time went by, families grew apart.

People moved for jobs. Marriages ended. Old grievances that had been buried under mashed potatoes finally surfaced.

There were no more big family Thanksgivings.

I would dutifully show up for the gatherings that remained, but my heart wasn’t in it.

It was the same thing every year.

Make dinner, overeat to the point of discomfort, go home to stare at the TV for the rest of the weekend. The connection I remembered from childhood was gone. We were going through motions, following a script because that’s what you do on the fourth Thursday in November.

Eventually I moved away from my family.

It was just my husband and myself.

The turkeys got smaller over the years as I got tired of eating leftover turkey in May.

(I’m not exaggerating—we’d still have frozen turkey soup when spring arrived.) I cut down on the sides because we never ended up eating them all. They’d sit in Tupperware containers in the fridge, little monuments to good intentions and food waste.

But the same pattern always happened.

I would get up knowing I had at least an afternoon ahead of me cooking.

Hubby was always a great help and we did it together. That was probably my favorite part of the holiday—working side by side, making something together.

Even if what we were making was something neither of us really wanted.

I like some turkey left over because turkey sandwiches are to die for.

But hubby and I like different parts of the bird, which meant someone was always disappointed.

We were performing gratitude instead of feeling it.

—————

The Question That Changed Everything

This year, at the beginning of November, I asked myself a simple question: Why?

Why was I doing this? Not the surface answer—because it’s Thanksgiving, because that’s what you do, because everyone else does it.

But the real why, the one that actually mattered.

I felt gratitude in me throughout the month.

Real gratitude, not performed gratitude. I smile and feel my heart greet the universe with happiness and joy because I am genuinely grateful for my life.

For the work I get to do.

For the person I’ve become. For the relationship I’ve built with my husband that’s based on genuine partnership, not obligation.

I just wasn’t going to be stuck with another commercial dinner that left me exhausted instead of nourished.

If I was going to celebrate gratitude, why not spend the day doing what I actually enjoyed?

Why not eat my favorite foods? Why not create a celebration that reflected who I am now instead of who society says I should be?

So that’s what I decided to do.

—————

The Taco Revolution

We all joke about how much we love tacos.

They’re actually one of my favorite foods—easy to make, endlessly variable, and satisfying in a way that turkey never quite manages. I enjoy making them and I enjoy eating them.

I can make fish tacos with lime and cilantro.

Or carnitas with all the fixings. Or keep it simple with seasoned ground beef and let everyone build their own perfect combination.

I take joy in choosing exactly what I want.

The food always tastes better when you’re making it from genuine desire rather than obligation.

There’s something sacred about cooking food you actually want to eat, for people who actually want to be there.

No performance. No pretending.

Just real food and real connection.

—————

What I’m Really Celebrating

I can spend time communicating with my loved ones—or spending time loving myself first.

I’m proud of all I’ve accomplished this year.

I love giving myself rest and healing instead of stress and performance anxiety over whether the turkey will be done on time or if there’s enough stuffing.

I’ll communicate with family, but more importantly, I’ll communicate with my chosen family.

The people I love who make my life richer. It doesn’t matter whether they share DNA with me or not. I just surround myself with really great people who see me, celebrate me, and let me do the same for them.

These are the people who’ve shown up for me.

Who’ve laughed with me over failures and cheered for my wins. Who don’t need a holiday to tell me they care, but who make holidays feel genuine when we celebrate together.

I made this decision at the beginning of the month, and it’s transformed my entire relationship with November.

This whole month has been one of gratitude—not just one Thursday surrounded by obligation and overeating.

—————

Your Permission Slip

Maybe you can throw away the turkey and have your favorite foods too.

What would your own day of gratitude look like if you stopped performing and started choosing?

If you honored what actually brings you joy instead of what you’re supposed to do?

Maybe you love the traditional dinner—the ritual of it, the comfort of familiar flavors, the satisfaction of mastering that perfect turkey.

If that’s true, beautiful.

At least you’re honest with yourself about what you want.

But if you’re like me—going through motions year after year, wondering why this celebration of gratitude leaves you depleted instead of nourished—maybe it’s time to ask different questions.

What would you eat if no one was watching?

Who would you spend time with if obligation wasn’t a factor?

How would you celebrate if you were designing it from scratch, based on what actually fills you with gratitude?

It might be worth finding out.

—————

Whatever you end up doing, I hope it’s a joy-filled day full of real gratitude.

Not the kind that comes with exhaustion and resentment, but the kind that fills you up and spills over. The kind that makes you excited rather than anxious. The kind that nourishes rather than depletes.

We have much to be thankful for.

Give the world your joy by doing what fills you with joy.

And you might find tacos on your menu as well.