Your Hilarious (& Heartwarming) Holiday Stories! (Encore)

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Welcome to We Can Do Hard Things pod squad as we begin the most

time of the year today

we bring you one of our favorite episodes featuring your most hilarious and heartwarming holiday stories so

we are just so deeply grateful that you spend your time with us this week and that you call us with your stories that make us laugh till we pee this pod is

absolutely co-created with you.

So thank you for sharing your hearts and minds with us this year.

We love you.

Reminder for this holiday season: don't forget to ask yourself, what do I want from these holidays?

And then make some time and space for that.

We love you, Pot Squad.

Joy to the world.

Welcome back, kids.

It's holiday season.

It's holiday season.

Welcome back to the show.

It's We Can Do Hard Things.

Wow.

Wow, Patty.

Patty sounds like an 80s disc jockey.

Let's get ready to rumble.

Here we are with the top 40.

Oh, man, I love it.

Everyone, set your tape recorders, plus play and record at the same time.

Yeah, so you can

see

Casey Casey's.

Of course we did.

And do you remember you'd have to wait to hear your favorite song?

I used to wait and listen and listen for

running just as fast as we can.

Can, can, can.

Holding on to one another's hand.

Hands, hands, trying to get away into the night.

And then you put your arms around me and we tumble to the ground.

And then we say.

Okay.

Okay.

And then you have to push play and record, and you'd get that shit.

Okay.

We are here with you, our favorite people on this entire Brutiful Earth, the pod squad.

And what we're doing today, we have gathered

your beautiful, beautiful, brutal, hilarious, embarrassing holiday stories.

Oh, yes.

And we have lots of strategies to get through stuff.

And that's what we do here.

We try to make life a little bit easier by talking about the hard.

And one of the things that we know that gets us through is absurdity.

We are going to be here together.

We are going to laugh.

We are going to cry.

We are going to remember that life isn't really all that serious.

And that's our goal for today: just laugh together and

release

joy

to the world.

Let's tell our stories first.

Okay.

Actually,

so you go.

Well, although my husband just listened, he came home last night, got in bed, and he's like, really?

With the heart sticker?

Really?

Wait, what?

The embarrassing story with the no underwear Geordie picture.

Oh, John.

I'm not listening to that one.

Yeah.

Anyway, but I don't know if you're looking having holidays, but I'll jump in if you jog the old memory.

Well, okay.

Mine is actually a little bit, it's not funny.

It's sweet.

But I was thinking, I was thinking, sister's like, that cute.

Listen, no one has more embarrassing stories than us.

We've actually gotten messages that say, how can Glennon have so many embarrassing stories?

And to you, I want to say, well, yeah, exactly.

Okay.

Exactly.

So I.

The second Christmas after the divorce,

first one was just really hard for everybody.

So we're going to skip over that one.

We're going to go to the one after the first one, which was the second Christmas with all of us together.

And we were gathering at

our house, which had used to be me and Craig's house, because that's how we had to do it during that time.

Awkward.

Yeah, it was just like, as every family that divorces and then tries to do the things together afterwards,

mine feels.

It's awkward at first, big time.

And it's awkward and then it's worse than awkward it's painful there's all these weird moments where you have to do things differently and the kids are looking at you like what the hell are we doing how are we doing this and then you're like trying to make it seem normal and anyway

so

second holiday

we're opening presents

and i open up the present from craig to me

And the kids are all around and I open it up and it's this thing that Craig has had made at the mall.

And it's this ornament and it's six snow people.

He had had

Craig,

Glennon, Abby, Chase, Amma, and Tish written on each of the snowmen's

scarves.

So sweet.

And so I opened it up and the kids were watching and it was just the snow people of our family all on one ornament that he had put us all on.

And it was just,

well, I think one of my top three holiday moments ever because it was just like, oh, this is how we're going to do it.

And he gave us that gift of like, here we are, the snow people family.

A little weird, but worry, we are six now.

There's nothing like cutting like a slice of the awkward with this beautiful ornament.

I know.

You know, I just, I was so, so touched by that.

I know.

Because it was like Craig saying, like, you're part of our family, Abby, and this is the way we're going to do it.

I know.

And it gave the kids permission to see us that way.

And it gave us all permission to not see us as like, we're this slice and that slice that is kind of, but we're like this one big snow person family.

I actually think that this is the moment that he made the holidays forevermore not awkward.

Yeah, maybe.

It was like this, this like gift that he gave everybody that was like, this is our family and this is how we roll.

Yeah.

Yes.

And also, this is our family.

And I declare it publicly on an ornament on our tree forever.

Yes.

It wasn't like a, this is our family and we'll just kind of, well, we'll roll with that, I guess.

It was like, no, we are, you know, because is there anything more official about a family than when you get the ornament with everyone's name on it?

Right.

It was pride.

It was like, no, we're proud of our snow person family.

Right.

Like, who says you have to be two snow people and 2.5 kids?

We are all these snow people and prove that we're not because the mall says we are.

Yeah.

Yes.

And you know, he had to custom order that because they usually don't come with three big snow people.

No, no, no.

To be clear, my snow person was a child.

Fake kid.

Okay.

It was Craig and Abby.

Yes.

Craig and Abby were the parents.

And then I was a child snow person.

This is like a shout out to all of the quote-unquote step parents, or we call myself a bonus parent.

I think we call them snow people from now on.

Snow people, yeah.

When we are decorating the tree, yeah,

it is really hard when you pull out all of the kids' first ornaments and their second ornaments, and all of the family ornaments that have happened well before I came around.

Yeah, and so here is now this moment that I am included in

putting my claim and my stake in this family on the tree during the time of which could be really othering or outsidering, you know?

Yeah.

So I don't know.

I just,

there are, there are a few moments like that, like when you guys start talking about the kids before I came around, it's like, it's like a, like a shot to the heart.

Yeah.

And so here.

I don't know.

I just think it's such a beautiful thing that Craig was able to do for me because he brought me in in all these ways that I'm sure he never even thought of.

Yeah.

But it was just, it's so touching and so Craig Melton.

Shout out to Craig Melton.

I'm sure he doesn't listen to this.

The last thing he needs is more of my voice in his ear.

But

if you are a friend of Craig, tell him we say thank you.

Exactly.

I just thought of a Christmas ornament story of my own.

Oh, Lord.

You did.

Do you remember when you were talking about gifts of um personalized Christmas ornaments?

I just had a flash of what you're gonna say.

I cannot believe you're gonna tell the pots about this.

No, shout to the heart because I probably wasn't around even when you guys were little kids.

I'm so much FOMO.

Sweetheart, you're gonna be glad you weren't around for this one.

Oh, really?

Okay, so, so, Abby, so when my first husband and I split, it was

we've gone over this, please see it on the episode.

Um,

but the weird thing is i didn't know anything was amiss so it was summertime we had a 10-minute conversation about it about the invidility

no so 10 minute conversation about the marriage is over then

another 10 minute conversation then i never see him again to this point like 15 years ago by now and i thought it was just you know

the I don't know what the hell I thought it was.

We didn't know what it was.

But anyway, it was done.

I'm stuck with this house that's very underwater.

I'm trying to rent it out.

I go to rent it out.

I'm at the house, like trying to get it set up.

I'm there, and this package comes, but it's for a name that is not the correct name.

So I'm like, that's weird, but I can't find an address.

I just like open it up, see if I can figure it out to send it back.

And it,

Abby,

is

a baby's first Christmas ornament

with a note congratulating

my husband on his new baby.

Oh my God, he was pregnant when he broke up with you.

It is

unclear.

I did go at that point when I was like, what the hell's going on?

I looked online and there was a baby registry

strongly correlated

with

a conception

before we were divorced.

But one cannot know.

One cannot know.

Seriously, one cannot know.

All I'm saying.

A Christmas immaculate conception.

I'm sure.

Yes.

All I'm saying is that that was my first personalized ornament.

Didn't go quite as well as yours.

I mean, questions answered.

It's the most wonderful time of the year.

Sister opened a baby's first Christmas ornament, and that is how she found out.

Whoopsie daisies.

You know, we've been through it, sissy.

We have been through it with the marriage situation.

We really got really close of getting away with it.

You know?

I mean, what is no one gets away with it?

This is what Aunt Bertha sends a Christmas ornament.

That is like that whole thing.

I don't know.

Yeah, how do you feel about it now?

Talk to us about now you're 15 Christmases later.

I mean, by the way, I remember that day, like with I remember standing in my kitchen at the sink and you telling me this story and just the blood rushing from my body, like my brain trying to put together like

the puzzle of what had happened.

I don't even remember how we got through that day.

I don't.

Not well.

Not well.

I,

you know what?

I just feel like

who knows?

This is my theory about life.

Who knows?

I still don't know what happened.

I still have no idea what happened.

I just think it's

it like I still have the ornament.

Yeah.

What?

Yeah.

It's on my fucking tree.

No.

What?

Oh my God.

You are such a badass.

It's on your tree.

Why?

Why do you still have that?

Because you know what?

I just feel like,

I feel like compartmentalizing our lives is dangerous.

I just don't feel like there's any

before or after, and there's no like, he's bad and I'm good.

And there's no, even if I could know whether he was cheating on me and that's why he left and that's why this baby came and that's why.

Who knows what any of it means?

I just, it was, it was real in my life and it reminds me of my most brokenness and it's up there with my my baby's beautiful faces and the things they've made for me.

And I just feel like it's like, why do we push away

those and pretend like that's not all part of the same stew that is who we are?

This is the most evolved thing I've ever heard.

That is so

beautiful.

Beautiful.

Wow.

The cracks are how the light gets in.

And who knows what's a crack?

Like, honestly, who knows what's a crack?

And I try to be open with my kids about it, about like,

you know, well, what happened?

And what was that like?

And just because it's a very windy path in this life.

And there's no like, well, that marriage was fucked up and this one's great.

And do you see the trajectory of life and how it took that hard walk to get to this beautiful life?

Like, no, it's just.

And then the next step is off the cliff.

Like, right.

The prize comes before the fall.

It's beautiful and a big fucking mess all at at once.

Yes.

Including our tree.

And we can't decide what's good.

You know what we thought was good?

That wedding day.

And it was.

But why?

But like, it's that story about the sage and then, and, and that every time something wonderful happened, the sage would say, they would say, it's good news, you won the lottery.

And he would go, is that so?

Bad news.

The lot, all your money means that somebody stole it.

Is that so?

Good news.

Is that so?

It's like we don't know what's good, what's bad, so we throw it all in the tree.

Yeah.

Sister, that is amazing.

I never knew that about you.

I learned something new about you today.

I did not know you kept that shit on your tree.

That's amazing.

That actually is so badass.

It gives me some hope.

Baby's first Christmas.

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do you want to tell a story do you want to move on to i do want to tell a quick story

i do

because

this has just got to be a big shout out to my mama because

talk about the hope and the dream of a perfect holiday my mom was like

really

always and still is so, it is the most important thing to her to have family organized parties and traditions.

And so what I'm about to tell you is just like a big apology to my mother

because

I wasn't the easiest kid.

And now being a parent, I understand more than I did as a child, like most of us do.

And so here I was this one year.

I think I must have been 10, maybe, maybe even younger.

I don't know exactly how old I was.

But I was going to be testing the idea of whether Santa was real or not.

Get your kids out of, if they're, if they are, if you haven't gotten them out already with all the fucks, please get them out now.

So we're going to have Santa discussion.

Yeah.

Good call.

Talking about fucking Santa.

Yeah.

Mute or fast forward.

My mom.

told us all we need to make a list.

And I was like, did she tell you to check it twice?

I was like, all right.

Yeah, no problem.

I'll make a list.

And she's like, where's your list?

And I was like, I'm not going to give it to you because if Santa is real, then he will know what my list is.

She was like, okay, got it.

But I really didn't make a list because I knew she would find it.

Because she's good.

Yeah.

She's not naughty.

She's not naughty.

She's legit.

You got it figured out by the time you come to your seventh kid.

So, fast forward to Christmas morning, sitting around.

I've got six brothers and sisters.

It's just mayhem.

There's just presents everywhere.

And for whatever reason, this year I had already gotten over Barbie.

I was a huge Barbie fan.

I had like the house.

I had the Corvette.

I bet you were.

And I was switching Ken and Barbie's heads back and forth.

Like, of course, this non-binary thing was our.

How do I make this work?

Yeah.

This doesn't look right for some reason.

Do I want to play with Barbie or do I want to be

perfect?

Do I want to play with Ken or do I want to be like Ken?

So all of these things.

But anyways, this year I got over Barbie.

First present shows up.

I get to go because we go in order from youngest to oldest and then oldest to youngest to everybody get the right turn.

And I open the present and I see the color pink Barbie.

And I opened it halfway and I was like, this is a Barbie.

And I threw it to the side.

And I was like, I hate Barbie.

Unbeknownst to me at the time, my mom didn't know what to get me.

So she was like, well, she likes Barbie's.

I'll just get her all Barbie stuff.

Every present was Barbie.

So

every single present was Barbie.

So every single time I'd open the present halfway, I'd throw it aside and go, I hate Barbie.

Barbie.

You know, and so at this point, my mom's having a total freak out because she knows

six presents is also Barbie's.

So she gets Beth on board, my eldest sister, Beth.

She's 11 years older.

She's like, go sit next to Abby and open up those presents and get her excited about

poor oldest sisters.

Like they're just trying to make it good and fun for all the youngest.

Are you okay?

Are you okay?

And so here I am

having the worst Christmas ever.

And this has set the tone for the rest of my life in terms of being a hard person to shop for.

My mom hates shopping for me because I was an asshole.

I had to teach her.

She, I kid you not, the first Christmas together,

we got her presents.

She would open them and be like,

I'd be like, thank you.

I was like, honey, you act

happy on Christmas.

This is great.

You act excited.

You lie.

You do your face.

I don't know.

You know, our family's weird that way.

No one else is like that.

I don't know.

Our family throws a parade for every sauce stocking stuffer.

It's not.

Yeah, is that right?

I just don't know if that's right either.

I think that there might be something in the middle, right?

Like, what is the best present you ever got me?

That I responded to the.

Ice Maker.

Oh, that's good.

The ice maker last year?

Yeah.

I really wanted that.

I really did.

What else?

I don't ever remember anything except for what's happening right now.

I'm just saying, Abby, that I don't know

that

that taught your mom a lesson.

I think it taught you a lesson.

Yeah.

Like you were trying to be real slick and not write down your list for your mom or for Santa, and you got a bunch of shit you hated.

That's wow.

I bet you wrote a list next year.

I probably did.

Expectations are resentments under construction.

You did not not share what you wanted.

And when we don't share what we want, we get Barbies.

Fucking Barbies.

Before we end the story, mom,

I'm very sorry.

Yeah.

And

I've set my whole life up for tough times in the present

business because of this.

And I can't help it.

I can't fake it.

No.

I can't fake it.

That's what I love about you.

If somebody gives me something that I'm never going to use, like kids, they gave me some stuff last year that.

Oh, I know.

You showed how you felt.

I just, it wasn't cool.

I was like, you know, you showed how you felt.

And this is a

waste.

I feel like it's a waste of time.

Anyways, okay.

Mom, I love you, and I'm sorry.

Let's hear holiday stories from the pod squad.

Very excited.

I think first we are hearing from Tina.

Hi, this is Tina on Christmas Day when I was a young girl.

My stepfather,

he baked a ham

and he baked the entire thing in the oven with the lid on completely in the bag.

And the funniest thing is, is when he pulled it out, me,

who just happened to be standing there and I am a connoisseur of cooking, even at a young age, I was like, oh my God, what is on the ham?

And he was like, what do you mean?

As he's basting it, I said, listen, you have to stop there is a bag on the ham so the actual plastic that comes with the ham he put the entire thing on and baked it and didn't know that's the best okay so pod squad glennon is confused so let me explain

hams and turkeys they come in that plastic that it's in a sealed like tight her stepdad put the ham in with the bag on and so the plastic melted

Well, did it say on the thing, take off the plastic?

Yes.

I mean, everything, there's that's not even a cooking thing.

That's a you just bought something from somewhere thing.

No,

you gotta take your hands.

Take the plastic off your shoes before you wear them.

No, I mean, that's not true.

There's bags of broccoli.

You put the whole thing in the microwave, right?

Right?

I mean, when you're trying to steam a bag?

Yeah.

Yeah.

He was steaming the ham in that eye stand.

But he put plastic in it that's going to melt.

I'm just going to tell you, I will die on this mountain eye stand with Tina's stepfather.

Yeah, we know.

The best part is he was basting it.

He was like,

let me just pour some nice, juicy fluids on this plastic.

Honey, do you know what basting means?

I hope.

Yes, that's the thing that people use to, what lesbians used to get pregnant.

A turkey basting.

Yes, that's right.

That's an old school model before IBS.

so lesbians invented it and then some people found out that it could be good for turkeys and then tina's stepdad appropriated it for the turkey okay let's hear from anna

hi glennon abby and sister my name is anna and i'm a mother of three young kids and so it's very common for me to refer to my husband as daddy

And so this was a few years ago.

We're at my mom and dad's house with all of my siblings and in-laws and nieces and nephews and sitting around the table having white Russians.

My parents have started a tradition of serving white Russians on Christmas Day.

So I'm sitting next to my dad and I take a sip of my white Russian and I say as I'm looking at him, yum daddy.

And the room goes silent.

Everybody looks at me.

My face turns beat red.

And then we all just erupt in laughter.

And so now every Christmas when white Russians are served, there is a lot of teasing about Yum Daddy.

Yum Daddy.

Yum Daddy.

Yum Daddy.

Ew.

Ew.

Ew.

So good.

Yum Daddy.

No, stop.

Okay.

All right.

Let's hear from Dusty.

I call Craig Daddy.

Yes, you do.

And it's really so weird.

So good.

My name is Dusty.

So when I was 12, my mom was really excited to do things up for Christmas.

It'd been a really hard year.

So she wanted to do all the lights.

Think like Martha Mae, Juvier from the Grim.

So I ended up on the roof with her trying to spell happy holidays with our strands of lights.

Except that we ran out of lights.

So instead, our house said happy ho all season.

And this is easily my favorite spell.

That would have been my favorite house.

That would have been my favorite house for sure.

Justy, that's amazing.

I want to see all the pod squads' pictures of themselves at Christmas with hashtag happy hoe underneath.

All the selfies.

So, yes, depending how you identify, you can either do hashtag happy hoe or hashtag yum daddy.

Ah, yes.

Okay, let's hear from Taylor.

Host.

Hi, my name's Taylor.

A little bit of background.

My parents divorced during COVID and we're all older.

So we're in our funnies and late teens, the youngest and we're four kids.

And we were newly navigating sort of this split holiday but doing it together situation.

And my mom and me and my sister right underneath of me have all been highly therapistized.

We are Zen, we are healthy, as healthy as you can be, and really working on our stuff.

So all of that said, my youngest sister is 17 and convinced the rest of us that it would be really funny to do the TikTok trends where all of the kids are sticking up their middle finger in the family photo.

But

it wasn't funny.

We did it.

My mom looked at the picture.

She actually laughed, but my dad just hysterically broke down crying, which caused my brother to cry.

And all of the women are just standing there.

looking at them like it was a joke like it was supposed to be funny and it turned into this huge

thing and none of us could stop laughing long enough to take anybody's feelings seriously and so we um talk about it as like flipping the bird magettin and we don't do holidays all together now we have two separate holidays all because my 17 year old sister wanted to follow a TikTok trend and convinced the rest of us that it was a good idea.

Wow.

I'm so surprised.

Oh my God.

And using pack this.

So they all were flicking off, and it just, that is the thing, that is the butterfly effect that set the emotions into

play.

And the men started crying, and then they don't do their holidays together anymore.

Jeez.

So all the people who are in therapy started laughing.

And the men who weren't in therapy cried and left.

Do you know what I mean?

And I think there's something there.

What?

Besides, I know TikTok things at Christmas

or Hanukkah, is

to me, that shows how whatever we're thinking about, whatever is the main thing on our minds,

we think everything is about.

Yes.

So they saw

the flicking off of the camera and they were like, see, this family hates each other now.

They hate this holiday.

They hate us.

It's all ruined.

When really they were actually having a great time, but you can't see past your own perception of what everything's about.

Yeah, everything's about everything.

Yep.

Oh, that's exactly.

I'll be thinking about that one for a while.

Let's do the trend this year.

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All right, Liz, let's hear from Liz.

My name is Liz, and bless my husband's heart.

He wanted to propose to me

in front of my entire family for Christmas.

And so him and my younger sister had it all planned out.

He gets the ring.

She knows what box it's in.

And

my sister knows what's going to happen, and I just have no idea.

idea.

And so I'm sitting here with my 88-year-old great-grandmother, my grandparents, and my eight-month-old son.

And my sister's been pestering me this entire time to open this box.

And I'm trying to do the whole Christmas thing, you know, trying to get the baby all settled.

And so I am aggravated.

Finally, I give in.

I'm like, give me the damn package.

I get this package and

I open it.

And I'm sitting there and I'm aggravated.

Get it open.

And I look at my husband and I said, what's this?

And he's down on one knee, asked me if I'd marry him.

My 88-year-old great-grandmother from across the room, who's been watching this entire time, yells, what's going on, Linda?

My grandmother goes, I'm not sure, Shirley.

And my sister yells, shut the hell up.

You just ask her to marry.

Oh, I love this family.

Yeah.

I want to hang out with Shirley and Linda.

What's going on?

I'm not sure, Linda.

Oh, my God.

It's so good.

This reminds me yesterday, I saw this tweet that said,

God, I love the holidays, the peace, the joy, the ornaments, the woman in front of me at Costco that just said, I don't care if we get your cousin a pile of shit, Larry.

Okay, let's hear from Katie.

Hi, Glennon, Abby, and sister.

This is Katie.

My wife, Lindsay, and I were traveling for Thanksgiving, and we stopped at a gas station to fill up.

And while my wife is filling up the car, I said, I'm going to go in and go to the bathroom.

So I go into the gas station, convenience store area, and they're single stalls.

So I pull in the women's door and it was locked.

And I had to go pee so badly.

So I was like, I'm just going to go in the men's.

So I go in the men's, I go to the bathroom, and then I leave.

And I'm kind of walking in the aisles of the convenience store trying to find snacks or something.

And I hear this woman kind of pounding on the door and she's yelling, like, get me out, get me out.

And I look over towards the bathrooms, and I see my wife is leaning against the women's stall door, like pinning it shut, bending over, laughing hysterically because she thinks I'm in the stall.

And so this woman is like pounding on the door.

She's like, get me out, get me out.

And Lindsay is again just like bent over, laughing.

She looks up and sees me, and then her jaw drops.

And I,

I, I lose it.

So now I'm laughing hysterically.

And she moves out of the way.

This woman comes flying out of the bathroom and looks at my wife and is like, what the hell is wrong with you?

And Lindsay just looks at it and is like, Happy Thanksgiving.

And I fell over at this point.

I think I was on the floor of the convenience store laughing hysterically.

What the hell is wrong?

Oh my gosh, that's like unlawful confinement.

Oh my gosh, that's so good.

How much fun.

I love couples that do that kind of stuff to each other.

Same, like play practical jokes and tricks.

And the other day, I was, I was hiding for like a solid five minutes.

Maybe that's all you do.

And so, like, I set the camera up and I'm ready.

By the other day, she means every day.

And, like, she walks upstairs and then she takes a different route that she normally takes.

So, she found me.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

All right.

Let's hear from Taylor.

My name is Taylor, and my partner and I do my favorite thing every Christmas.

We were inspired.

Both of our dads passed away when we were 17-year-olds.

And we

have had a lot of other significant deaths in our family.

And so now for Christmas, we buy each other gifts in honor of those people.

So my husband calls it on behalf of and their behalf gifts and their favorite things to open around Christmas.

So hopefully that inspires you all to keep the memory of your loved ones with you and make that liminal space very present in your life.

Thank you for all y'all do.

I love you all and I'm just so thankful.

Bye.

That's awesome.

That's beautiful.

That's very cool.

So she's saying they give gifts on behalf of someone who's passed.

So good.

That's really beautiful.

I'm going to start doing that.

All right.

I'm going to do it.

Let's hear from Adrienne.

This is Adrian, and I have a holiday story, which is I have always loved Christmas since I was a kid.

I was the ringleader.

of loving Christmas.

And then I went to college.

I got politicized.

I learned about capitalism, and I was like, I'm not down for this capitalist holiday and all this stuff.

So I have to pull my family like, look, post-capitalist, okay?

So I come home, wake up Christmas morning with my sisters, and we come downstairs and there's no gifts, nothing, no stockings.

There's just nothing.

Now, mind you, I'm like 24, 25.

Like there's no children in the house.

Maybe there shouldn't be anything, but the look on my face apparently betrayed my anti-capitalism to my entire family.

And my dad started laughing like the grand shoe stole Christmas.

And

I was trying to play it cool.

I'll just have some grown-up coffee.

This is fine.

Like, it's fine.

Meanwhile, inside, I'm six years old and crying and devastated.

Then my parents go upstairs and they came down with these like very elegant bags of like adult gifts.

And they were like, we are you?

but mostly they're just laughing in my face.

And every year, every year, I get to hear this story.

Oh, yeah.

Adrian's parents for the win.

Yep.

You know, all of our children are anti-capitalist until they need a plane ride home.

That's right.

Until they need to test anti-capitalism with a little Christmas attitude.

Yeah.

That's so good.

That's so good.

Okay, Emma.

Hi, my name is Emma.

I do really love to cook.

And my family and grandma and mom and I have always cooked together.

So, one day I was like, you know what?

I'm gonna do friendsgiving, I'm gonna cook this meal.

And so, I texted the whole family group chat and said, You know, I really love our secret family recipe, the green bean casserole, with like the cream of mushroom, the green beans, and the fried onions.

Classic.

I said, Can you send me the secret family recipe?

To which my entire family replies,

And by secret family recipe, do you mean the green bean casserole recipe that's on the can of fried onions that all of the United States of America makes every Thanksgiving story?

So there's my short and sweet story.

I'm still made fun of to this day.

Well, after that story,

yeah, after that story, we have to mention Phoebe Buffet's

grandmother's secret chocolate chip recipe that she was going to take to her crave.

And the recipe was by Nestle Told House.

Nestle Told House.

Love me some Phoebe.

Okay, Jen.

Hi, my name is Jen, and this is a bittersweet holiday story.

When I was 27, my mom was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.

And as we neared the holidays, we realized she wasn't going to be here for Christmas.

And also realized that all of our family traditional Czech recipes were in her mind, in her brain, and had never been written down, just passed down orally.

So we decided stupidly to recreate Christmas in October with her so we could share the meal with her and write down all these recipes.

The first misstep was the pork gravy.

So we're supposed to broil the drippings at 500 degrees, according to my mom's brain, which wasn't at peak capacity at that point.

And the first thing to happen is smoke billowing out of the oven.

And my four-year-old nephew knows what to do in a fire thing is running through the house screaming, quick, quick, fire, we have to get out of here evacuate which alleviates some tension and then next was the potato dumplings and when we scooped those little suckers out they were pure rubber we had screwed up something along the line and my mom was pissed and devastated so she chucked one of those little into the sink and it ricocheted around like a bouncy ball off the sides of the sink and we all just erupted into the silent laughing tears streaming down your face can't breathe laughter and it was beautiful and amazing.

And we had a wonderful, albeit chewy and burnt meal, but it was a beautiful last memory with her.

And I think about every year when I make those little dumplings and they turn out wrong, and it just brings me joy.

I think that story is so beautiful.

Yes, she said wonderful.

I albeit burnt and rubbery.

I just feel like so much could be said of life it's wonderful albeit burnt and rubbery that's right they turn out wrong and it brings me joy

it's like

all the mess of it is the beauty of it

thank you jen

let's hear from jackie hi my name is jackie i had just recently started dating this guy in my early 20s and i was out at the bar with his family and talking with his mom on the side.

And she told me that she was going to be asking her husband for Christmas for the magic bullet.

And I proceeded to tell her how I wanted a magic bullet as well.

And I thought it was really interesting that she was so open with me.

This was our first Christmas together.

You know, thought she was telling me about her sex toys that she was going to be asking from her husband.

So she's telling me, Oh, yep, the one that I want has all different speeds, different pulses.

And I ask her if she is going to get the one with the massage glove.

And she looks at me and she's like, I don't know about the massage glove.

I am talking about a blender.

Wait, did she say this is her mother-in-law?

Yeah.

She says, she was just dating this guy.

Hold on, I'm recapping.

Jackie was dating a guy.

She went to a bar with his family and she was talking to his mom.

And his mom said she wants a magic bullet.

And she said, I also want a

vibrator.

A magic bullet.

Oh my God, I can't believe how cool this mom is.

She's talking to me about wanting a vibrator.

But I think she was talking about one of those things that they have on like QVC.

A blender.

A blender.

Yeah, like a neutra bullet, the thing you turn upside down.

And she thought she was talking about the freaking silver bullet.

Oh, is that what it's like?

Jackie was comparing notes to see if she was getting the best model.

And so I asked her if she wanted, if she was going to get the one with the massage setting.

Oh, she said, I don't know about the massage setting.

No, massage gloves.

The massage gloves.

Jackie thought she was about to have the coolest mother-in-law ever.

Oh, God, that's so good.

Jackie, thank you for that.

You've made my Christmas better.

Krista.

Hi there.

My name is Krista.

About five or six Thanksgivings ago,

we have two little kids.

They were playing, running around outside.

We were running around outside, and our dog was out there as well, unbeknownst to us.

She disappeared somewhere into our neighborhood for maybe 10 minutes, pops, came back, all was well.

We loaded the kids, the dog, all the food into the car, and we are heading to my mom's house for a lovely Thanksgiving dinner.

So we get down there, everything's great, until about 15 minutes before we sit down, all of a sudden our dog throws up an entire honey-baked fried ham.

How do I know it's honey-baked?

Because the crackling edges were still attached.

to the ham.

It was perfectly sliced.

It was clear to anyone what it was.

My mom looks at me for an explanation.

I just kind of shrug.

I have no idea.

I look at my husband for an explanation.

He also has no clue.

We eventually clean it up and move on with the family dinner.

The problem is, to this day, we have no idea which of our neighbors had to order pizza for their Thanksgiving dinner because our dog ate their ham.

I am still absolutely horrified.

My dog, on the other hand, does not seem to care.

She walks around the neighborhood like she owns it, like everything's fine,

like she just

really wanted some ham.

Could you imagine?

A lot of people use like their garages or outdoor area to like keep things cold because you don't have enough room in your refrigerator for the holiday food.

Could you imagine having your ham or turkey or whatever outside and then like going out to like, you know, know

you've preheated the oven you're gonna bring it to room 10

ham is gone

it's just gone without family

still talking like what do you do do you look around for it like did this ham get up and run away you'd be yelling at everyone oh you know they were all blaming each other yeah and then i'd be like wait did i buy the ham

i didn't buy the ham this year

do you know what's fascinating is that the whole thing came up and

it was still in its like pre-sliced

shithole.

They do.

I mean, the other thing that's really interesting to me is that this dog ruined somebody's holiday.

I don't know what I was going to say.

I had a really good point.

I don't know what I love.

No, it was going to be good.

Damn it all to hell.

It's okay.

The pre-sliced?

No.

No.

Okay.

All right.

Let's hear from Teresa.

Hi, this is Teresa.

I have a heartwarming holiday story to share with Pazquad.

I was getting divorced in 2014, and it was very hard for me because I loved my ex-husband's family.

He had a large, extended family.

They were all very good to me, and I

was feeling really lonely on Christmas Eve because that was always big family extravaganza.

And that was always one of the highlights of the year for me.

My family doesn't live here, and they'd kind of left me on my own anyway through the whole divorce.

So I was sitting at home kind of in a moat, feeling really sad.

And then there was a knock at the door and I opened the door and it was my soon-to-be ex-husband's cousin who was bringing to me a butter dish pepperware.

That's the fancy Polish Tepperware if you're in Buffalo or anywhere in the Midwest.

full of goulash from my ex-husband's grandmother who knew that I was sitting at home alone missing everything and missing her goulash in particular, which is always a big holiday highlight.

And she handed it to me through the door as if it was some sort of transaction of like sacred documents or something and said, grandma wanted you to have this.

And Merry Christmas.

And I think it was the best gift I ever received was that tub full of grandma's goulash.

So sometimes it's the little things that are really the big things.

Thanks.

Happy holiday.

You know what else is good, grandmas?

Grandmas who just include women, whether they're on the ins with their families or they're outs with their families.

Like the people who think of

the person who might be lonely and just reach out something little.

That would be a good thing for this holiday.

Yeah.

Just to think of somebody in your life who might be a little lonely this holiday and just reach out.

I also remembered what I was going to say before.

What?

If the family of this ham

is listening, if one year a ham went missing, please call in and leave a voicemail.

Yeah.

I need to hear it from your side.

And also, I just love the idea of

that you can just maybe rise up above a little bit of that just because people are no longer going to be married, that that has to be whole cloth cutting off from them.

I mean,

where it's possible, I think little gestures like that.

Yeah.

Again, the compartmentalizing

that we talked about before.

It's just like, there's no world in which someone was a huge part of your life and your traditions and you loved them and you cared for them and you spent all of these important events with them.

And then the next year, because of something totally separate from you, it's like, well, that's no longer a thing.

We force ourselves to do emotional gymnastics instead of realizing that the truth of it is if you cared about them then,

you care about them now.

And it may be in a little more complicated of a way, but we make it too tidy.

And in making it too tidy, I think

we hurt other people and we hurt ourselves.

If you have love for people, you can show it.

Yeah.

I also think.

in terms of like divorces and isn't the holidays supposed to be about trying to like be of joy and love and inclusion and it's like when this divorce thing happens there automatically becomes this weird exclusion yeah in and out and like this person's now on the outside and i just i don't believe in that you know like

marriages happen people happen i love some of my in-laws that are no longer married to my brothers

you know and i think that that's really important that they know that i love them and no matter what my nieces and nephews are half theirs yeah that's right

well i love this

wild huge family we've created this pod squad it has just been a great joy of my life this year and it makes me feel comforted to know that no matter what

the next year brings, we will be back here next year at the same time telling ridiculous stories together and reflecting on the year together and preparing to do the next year together.

And for that constancy, I am grateful.

And

I just hope all of you find some tiny bursts and slices of joy inside all of the mess that the next week will inevitably bring.

And peace.

Yeah.

Little flashes of peace.

And I love you, sister.

And I love you, Abby.

And you will be the gift and the present.

Your presence will be our best present.

I hope so because I haven't bought a lot.

I love you, Abby.

I love you, G-Bird.

I love you, Pod Squad.

I love you guys so much.

And I want to buy sister all of the things.

I know.

We do like sisters.

Please act on that impulse.

We love you.

Enjoy your people.

If you're alone, enjoy yourself because you are the thing.

If you're with people, you are the thing too.

That's right.

We'll see you next time.

Love.

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