Holiday Warfare :: Personal Narrative, Autobiographical Essay

Holiday Warfare Brave men of war have faced adversities both physical and mental 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 iron men these trials created go down in history as examples to all mankind. I have faced battle under duress and have learned 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 Grandmother's kitchen. No man should have to endure these conditions. Women can, with impunity, set foot in the estrogenically charged atmosphere of Grandmother's 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. Counting 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 young 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 George's new haircut yet, Denny?" asked Granny. Shot 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 look like a porcupine," chimed in my Aunt Molly, correctly answering the subtle part of the question and putting any doubts about the spike haircut and its social value to rest. "Uncle Dwight's been smoking again," Granny mentioned tersely.