THE MOCKTAIL BAR: THANKSGIVING UNDONE

When was the last time you went to Thanksgiving and nobody was drinking? Maybe never, right?

Look, Thanksgiving can be incredible one year—family everywhere, amazing food, some good football, and none of that gift-giving pressure from Christmas. But for a lot of us? The pressure isn't wrapped up in a bow. It's the deep wounds between siblings. The resentment between parent and child. The unresolved trauma that's just too damn hard to crack open. That shameful thing from your past that weighs on you every time you walk into a room with people who actually know you—who remember everything, and might be standing there in judgment.

Sometimes Thanksgiving is only tolerable if your feelings are numb. A little numb. Or a lot numb. Thanksgiving is the heaviest drinking week of the year. And it's not all celebration—most of it is coping. Surviving a few days with the people who know you best.

For years, I cooked the turkey. Not inside with the women who were lovingly preparing all their best dishes. I barbecued mine. Low and slow. Six hours on the grill, fire started nice and early. My own Thanksgiving celebration—on my own.

Those first turkeys? I called them Jack and Ginger. Marinated in Jack Daniels, ginger ale, spices, and a good squeeze of orange. But let's be honest—that Jack and Ginger with a slice of orange wasn't just for the turkey. Some mornings I'd start the fire at 6:30 AM, and that magic elixir? It was for me too.

The unrelenting pressure from work, payroll, unresolved conflict, the weight around my neck—knowing what I was doing, what I was hiding from, was just one big fucking lie. Massively functional on the outside. Rotting on the inside. It was a long slow burn over twenty years that got me there.

But about five and a half years ago, it all changed. Just in time, because a lot of hard stuff entered my life that put me right in the middle of the storm for a few years. Thank God I got to go through that sober—seeing clearly, making better choices about how to handle the difficult things that showed up.

Thanksgiving 2023 was the first one we'd hosted in years. Uncle Joe used to have a full bar, a blender, case of wine ready to roll. But that man is gone now. I had a mocktail bar instead. It wasn't even a surprise for the family because slowly but surely—actually, pretty damn quickly over two or three years—the "sober curious" movement swept through my family.

Our Thanksgiving turned dry. But fun. We were present. We talked to each other and actually remembered our conversations the next day. Nobody did anything idiotic. Nobody walked through a screen door. Nobody fought over who had to give up their keys. It was incredible.

I still ran the bar—seasonal Arnold Palmers, cranberry orange spritzers, a spicy orange ginger drink that the uncles and the little nieces both loved. We didn't miss anything. It was probably the best Thanksgiving we'd ever hosted. Seriously present. Nothing in the way of real conversation. The room still full of laughter and real talk—not just lip service drowned out by the dulling effects of alcohol. We got to face each other at Thanksgiving. And it was wonderful.

Look, I know Thanksgiving isn't going to be perfect in everybody's family. I'm still walking through storms with a couple siblings. But covering up with the anesthesia we take before family gatherings? Keeping that IV drip wide open during the event? That's not the way. No healing can happen there. It only gets worse.

I'm not saying rip open a big scab in the middle of Thanksgiving dinner. But there's a way to be present and patient and grateful—without that prescription we write ourselves before we walk through the front door.

Maybe—just maybe—the mocktail bar belongs at your Thanksgiving this year.

Joe