If you are an American, I hope you enjoyed your Thanksgiving spread. If you’re like me (and if you are, I hope you are seeing a therapist) you will carry memories of it in your hips and thighs for months to come.

 

 

My holiday spread begins at Thanksgiving and usually ends around Labor Day when I overindulge for the very last time this year (honest!) because I believe in moderation in all things. I also believe that my body’s remembrance of meals past enlarges me and makes me a bigger person, so I’m conflicted.

 

 

Of course, not everyone celebrates when you begin spreading, especially if you are sitting next to them on an airplane. These whiners tend to be the same people who object to using “them” with the antecedent “everyone” in that last sentence. I should know because I object as well. But only if I discover the usage in a student’s paper. In my own writing, in order to avoid using the awkward “him or her” or wasting time rewriting the sentence with a plural subject, I pull out my Shakespeare card and say, “I follow my Will.” He did, as you know, write the lines, “There’s not a man I meet but doth salute/As if I were their well-acquainted friend.” If the objector continues to complain, I pull out my failed poet card, put it next to Shakespeare’s, and say, “Bards of a feather flock together.” That rarely convinces anyone, but I take my pleasures where I can.

 

 

If you skipped that last paragraph, I congratulate you on your astuteness. It has little relevance to the purported point of this post. If you didn’t skip that last paragraph, well, better luck next time.

 

 

Now, where were we? (I hate it when I lose my spread of thought.)

 

 

Holiday spread happens, as does secondhand holiday spread (the encroachment of your spread into other people’s space.) This year show your love by giving Spanx.

 

 

Happy Spanxgiving!