Boyfriends Are Embarrassing Now, So Cuffing Season Is Officially Over.

Vogue has officially announced that boyfriends are embarrassing now. So cuffing season is cancelled. Finished. Set down gently and rolled into storage. We can now move freely without the pressure of finding a seasonal man to drape across our couches like décor.

And honestly, that feels fitting because the holidays themselves hit very differently once you’re grown.

When You're Not in Your Twenties Anymore…

Back in my twenties the holidays were normal, the same way they had been my whole life. My mom or my sister cooked for the house. It was me, my brothers, my nephew… all of us together like we always were. At some point during the day, we would all go to my dad’s house, except my mother since they were divorced, and then later me and my siblings would split off to hang with our friends. That was the rhythm. That was the default.

Nothing really changed until I went away for grad school.

Once I moved across the country, coming home for Thanksgiving stopped making sense. Thanksgiving was too close to Christmas and who is flying across the country twice within twenty days? Not me. Absolutely not. And honestly, I loved Rhode Island. I had my own life, my own routine, my own little world there. Skipping Thanksgiving wasn’t sad for me. My landlords even loved me enough to invite me to dinner. Did I go? No. I am an introvert. Not happening. But staying put felt natural. Not going home just became reality. And once you break a tradition, even unintentionally, it slowly stops feeling like a tradition at all.

And that is how the holiday started fading for me. Not in a dramatic way. It just shifted into something different.

Thanksgiving Looks Different Now.

I do not celebrate Thanksgiving in the traditional way. Over time the holiday simply stopped holding meaning for me. Now, at 39 heading toward 40 (80s babies stand up), I still love the food, but the rest of it… meh. I’ll show up for a Friendsgiving here and there, but this year I am very happily ordering the meal-for-two from Clyde’s. It looks incredible and it requires zero labor from me. Which is perfect considering I am the girl who can only make soup and lattes.

And I think a lot of people are quietly experiening that same shift. Life changes, and when it does, you change. Your traditions evolve, fade, or reshape themselves into something new. That is not sad or dramatic. It’s just real-life unfolding. So maybe this season is less about finding someone to sit next to and more about honoring where you actually are.

And by the way, just so we are clear, this is not a “please invite me to your Thanksgiving” post. If you do, just know I am not coming. I am an introvert, remember?