I'm in McKinney Texas. I hate Texas. The only reason I come to Texas is because a dozen or so people who swim around in the same gene pool live in this tragically suburban part of the globe. I also come to Texas on occasion because the people who pay me live and work here as well, but that's beside the point. We all know I'm a whore.

Tomorrow is the day my family is going to share one or two rooms in a big house in Texas, and we are going to eat a lot of untraditional Thanksgiving fare like baked eggplant and banana bread and zitis and sausage and stuff, and we are all going to talk too loudly and eat too much and within a few hours, each of us will likely be anxious to find at least one quiet corner of the house where we can sit and nurse the oncoming headache.

This corner will not be found.

Simultaneously, there will be at least three, possibly five dogs under foot at all times. These dogs will be chasing squeaky toys and laser beams and each other and desperately seeking morsels of Thanksgiving goodness dropped from the hands of four toddling, screeching, giggling tousle-headed miscreants, all of whom at one point will get sent to a corner wailing or whining because of something they did to someone else that may or may not be illegal under the Geneva convention.

I have (another) cold and despite this post nasal drip, will be sleeping on the floor in a very tiny office with a very faithful dog. I will be awakened every morning by five by a squawking parrot or a squawking matriarch or, on occasion, by a two-ton mastiff's wet and snorting nose after he breaks through the French doors to pounce on my previously snoring head.

And people wonder why families drink during the holidays.

I am here willingly.

I am here because it is for these nutjobs that I am most thankful. Despite the noise and nuisance, despite my bald head and bad shoulders, these short, manic, frequently shouting Italians are my tribe. All I am is because of these people, so despite the fact that I'd rather remove a kidney with a grapefruit spoon than live in suburban Dallas, I make the trek here every year because I can't imagine not making this trek. No matter how aggravating the trip or how infuriated I've ever been at any of them, a holiday without them wouldn't be a holiday. And during those holidays there isn't any other place I'd rather be.

And that I CAN be here, I am very thankful indeed.