Holiday Warfare :: Personal Narrative, Autobiographical Essay

Holiday Warfare   Brave men of war have faced adversities both physical and psychical and risen above them as butter from cream. Chivalry and conquest have carried soldiers from pole to pole and across the seven seas. Hardships of campaign life are legendary, and the weightlift men these trials created go down in history as examples to all mankind.   I have faced battle under duress and have erudite I am not a brave man. Shell-shock is partially defined as a psycho neurotic condition akin to hysteria. To this day I am saddled with the memories of the day I was sent to battle in my Grandmothers kitchen. No man should have to endure these conditions. Women can, with impunity, set foot in the estrogeni confabulatey charged atmosphere of Grandmothers kitchen on Thanksgiving Day greater men than I, however, have been broken this way. Men of the world take heed, only the insanely brave or exceedingly foolish would choose to accept this near-suicide mission. Count ing myself as the latter, I offer my tale as counsel.   The day was overcast, cold and thoroughly November. I answered the call to arms with the eager sincerity of a private fresh from basic training. My Grandfather wept openly, fearing for my life as I bade him farewell. I entered a novel soldier brimming with bravado I returned a troubled man with bruised ego, clutching hard-won wisdom to my breast.   The fact that women are vastly better equipped for a culinary tete-a-tete with Grandmother should have been apparent to me after the opening salvo, but I was too green, too new and shiny, to heed.   Have you seen your cousin Georges new haircut yet, Denny? asked Granny. barb number one had been fired, and I did not even hear the air-raid sirens.   Yeah, I like it, I answered with none of the suspicion that has dogged me at holidays since my tour of duty.   It makes him sapidity like a porcupine, chimed in my Aunt Molly, correctly answering the su btle part of the question and putting any doubts about the spike haircut and its social nurse to rest.   Uncle Dwights been smoking again, Granny mentioned tersely.