(I wrote this post two years ago. This year I have passed into the acceptance phase. Dinner with the family. While turkey will be served, there’s a vegan option on the table too. That’s progress!)    

Thanksgiving is the only day of the year I (kind of) hate being a vegan. Usually, I am quietly proud of my choice but not on Thanksgiving.

To me, Thanksgiving is about family, football and snarky Nouveau Beaujolais-infused fights about politics. Thanksgiving is about laughter, communal cooking and the joy/frustration of claustrophobic togetherness. On Thanksgiving, decades of accumulated memories get coaxed from neurological hibernation by the seductive smells of thyme and pumpkin spice and – I am loath to admit it – roasted turkey.

At least that’s what it used to be about; until veganism snuck up on me three years ago and irrevocably stole my heart. Now, on Thanksgiving, I find myself slogging through a day that has a celebration of animal cruelty and dead flesh as its centerpiece. A plucked, baked turkey carcass held high, presented to the gathering of family and friends, to me, feels like people applauding bird murder.

Harsh, right? But no worries, I keep it all to myself.  Most of the time, at least.

Here’s the conundrum: Why, given my newly discovered discomfort with the savoring of the flesh, do I still long to be part of an annual gathering of large bird assassins?

Finally, after years of pondering, it hit me. When it comes to Thanksgiving, vegans experience the Kubler-Ross classic five stages of grief.

It’s a relief to put a diagnosis, however flighty, to my hypocrisy.

For the first two years, I was stuck in denial (that’s stage one). Sides! Focus on the sides. Bring your own tofurkey. Elbow your way in and cook it right next to the dead bird if you have to. Mix and mingle, the old with the new. Turn your head discreetly when the dead bird is paraded forth. Above all, be quiet. Smile and divert the conversation when ridiculed for your habits.

Last year, I hit the second stage of grief: anger. Thanksgiving was dead to me. I spent the day wandering around Whole Foods, sampling the vegan mashed potatoes and mushroom gravy. I spoke to no one. I made no family Thanksgiving phone calls. Fuck the bird killers!

In hindsight, it was a sad, lonely and pathetic day.

This year, I’m at stage three: depression. I don’t want to go to anyone’s house and celebrate death, but I don’t want to cook at home either with a bunch of fake turkey stuff. So much culinary work to mangle kale and brussel sprouts into a replacement for the centerpiece of death. What’s the point?

A simple truth: the day IS about the turkey and the getting up at the crack of dawn to cook it, the worry about the gravy made from giblets (will it thicken?), and the stuffing infused with savory turkey fat. No amount of tofurkey can change that.

But really, on Thanksgiving, what I miss the most is a mountain of whipped cream on top of pecan pie. Or a pumpkin pie. Or any kind of pie. Or just whipped cream. Frankly, I’m a bit ashamed of these adulterous thoughts. But there it is. The muddle of Thanksgiving.

What’s a vegan to do?

When depressed, find your tribe. As part of working my way through stage three, I’m volunteering for Meals on Wheels this year. Yes, it’s dead flesh I’m wheeling out to lonely seniors, but at least the event matches my mood. After meal delivery, I’m paying $45 to attend – with The Cowboy, bless him – a communal meal of strangers at a local vegan restaurant.

I’m not sure that’s much of an improvement over last year’s Whole Foods loneliness in stage two. Maybe anger trumps depression.

Here’s my goal for next year: Skip over the fourth stage of bargaining (who would I bargain with?) and accelerate to acceptance by next Thanksgiving.

But that raises the root question I’ve been avoiding: what does acceptance mean in this circumstance? Is Thanksgiving redeemable for vegans? I will never get my family here for a vegan meal. They want the dead bird.

I’m optimistic. We’ll see how the paid communal meal goes. Maybe I’ll discover a few recipes that will wow the relatives to my place next year. Sans-turkey. Maybe I’ll find that there’s a sixth, even a seventh, stage of grief that has to do with compromise in the name of incremental progress. Or maybe vegans need to claim a new holiday. Turn Black Friday into a cruelty free, community-building gourmet “Green Friday.”

We’ll see.

In the meantime, Happy Thanksgiving to everyone.deeo.ru