Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is right around the corner again, and I'm facing a stressful situation this year. You see, every year our tradition is for all of our friends and their families to get together at a warehouse where several of the friends live. This has been going on for a long time, and it's always a lot of fun -- I look forward to it all year. But more importantly, it changed Thanksgiving for my family -- a holiday that had not been great since my Grandmother died directly following it. My family's attempts at creating a new tradition after my parents divorced and my brother moved away were, well, pathetic, to say the least. With only my Mother, my other brother, my husband and myself, we would try a new approach every year -- like the year my brother cooked the turkey in his apartment, only to discover that he'd left in the giblets and the whole thing was pretty much frozen in the center and burned on the outside. Or the year we decided to go out to eat, without checking to see if the chosen restaurant was actually open. So the new tradition of the past several years has turned the holiday around for me, making it something I look forward to instead of dread.

Not this year, though. One of the friends who has more recently moved into the warehouse has betrayed me in a very hurtful, costly, and public way. (I may write more about it later, but for now, let's just say that there was a business involved, and the situation may become a legal one. 'Nuf said.) Now, it's not enough, aparently, that she has sabotaged my life and career and stuck me with all of the responsibility and debt for our jointly owned business, but it seems that she has also been trash-talking me for quite some time and appears to be on a campaign to exclude me from the circle of friends that she met as a result of her friendship with me. I'm hurt, enraged, and frankly, a little surprised. I'm not sure what I did to her that was so bad, and she doesn't even return my phone calls, so there's not much chance of an explanation. (And since she floats down the river of denial it's not likely she'd even admit to anything.) I have noticed a strange vibe amongst this circle of friends, but I don't know if that's my own paranoia or if I'm witnessing the results of a stealth campaign against me. Either way, it's going to make Thanksgiving stressful this year, but I have no intention of skipping it. But I also don't want my friends to be in the middle, and don't want to make things awkward for anyone. All I can do is be the bigger person, and be the best human being I can. And if that isn't enough for people, then I guess I can conclude that they never really were my friends to begin with.

My classic mode of dealing with confrontation is to avoid it. Don't get me wrong -- I'm a pretty scrappy hothead, and most people who know me wouldn't believe the above statement. But it's true -- when confronted with a person that I've grown to deeply dislike (which is extremely rare), I tend to avoid that person at all costs. Since I hate a public scene more than anything, I will just act like I don't know the person when I'm in the same room with them. I'm not good at being fake, so I figure the best way is to do what my Mother taught me -- "if you don't have anything nice to say, say nothing at all". So far, this tactic has worked. (And before you get the idea that I'm some psycho that's running around avoiding people, there are really only 3 people out of the hundreds that I've known in my lifetime that I've ever felt this was necessary with. And none of them are ex-boyfriends.) The above-mentioned former friend has entered this category, but since we are in the same building every day and share this group of friends my usual strategy (which, admitedly, is emotionally retarded) will not work. But I'm not sure what to do in it's place. Do I try to smooth it over before the holidays for everyone's comfort? That would require me stuffing my considerably strong feelings into a deep, dark place and doing the best acting job I've ever done. Do I force a confrontation with this person? That would do neither of us any good, although I'd probably feel better. Is there a way to call a truce?

What's needed is someone to mediate, I suppose. But I don't think there's anyone who can. It's going to have to be dealt with, but how? How do I keep the peace with someone I've grown to actually hate? How do I get over my feelings of betrayal so that everyone can enjoy the holiday without being poisoned by all of this excess vitriol floating through the air?

There's a part of me that just wants to run away and not deal with any of it, but then the terrorist wins.