Surviving the Holidays: Seven Lines for Thanksgiving and Christmas

The holidays are supposed to be merry. For a lot of us, they're also the dread in the car on the way over. The relative who saves up a year of opinions. The kitchen nobody else seems to notice is on fire.

You can't change the guest list. You can pick what you're wearing to it. Here are seven lines that have seen worse than your family dinner, each one traced to the page it came from.

One Christmas, our founder tried to get the table talking. She asked everyone for the best Christmas they could remember. The answers went around: the year someone got the bike, the year it snowed. Then it got to her son. He said two words: "This one."

That's the holiday we're all hoping for. The lines below are for getting there.

Thanksgiving

For the week before, when you're already dreading it

"We suffer more often in imagination than in reality."

— Seneca, Letters to Lucilius, Letter XIII

You've already had the argument three times this week. In the shower. In the car. At 2 a.m. Seneca wrote this to a friend who was doing the same thing. Most of what he dreaded, he said, never showed up. The full story is on its quote page.

Model photo created with AI. The printed line is real.

Already had the argument three times. In her head. Shop the tee →

For the argument at the table

"When any one contradicts me, he raises my attention, not my anger."

— Michel de Montaigne, "Of the Art of Conference," Essais, Book III, Chapter 8 (1588), translated by Charles Cotton

Someone says something across the turkey. You can bristle, or you can get curious. Montaigne chose curious, and wrote a whole essay on how to argue without wrecking the room. Shop the tee →

For the cousin who has "always done it this way"

"Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative."

— Oscar Wilde, "The Relation of Dress to Art," Pall Mall Gazette (February 28, 1885)

Same casserole. Same seat. Same story about the year the oven broke. Wilde would have brought a new dish just to watch the reaction.

Model photo created with AI. The printed line is real.

Bring the new dish anyway. Shop the tee →

For whoever ends up doing the dishes

"Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits."

— Mark Twain, The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson, Chapter XV (1894)

Someone loaded the dishwasher wrong. You know who. Twain knew the feeling, and he also knew the joke is partly on you.

Model photo created with AI. The printed line is real.

You know who loaded it. Shop the mug →

Christmas

For the old grudge that shows up every year

"Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs."

— Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre (1847), Chapter VI

Helen Burns says this the same day a teacher beats her in front of the class. She still won't keep score. If she could let it go, maybe the thing from 2009 can go too. Shop the mug →

For ten minutes alone in the car

"Silence more musical than any song;"

— Christina Rossetti, "Rest," Goblin Market and Other Poems (1862)

The house is loud. The kids are louder. You "forgot something in the car." Rossetti called her poem "Rest," which is also what musicians call a silence written into a song on purpose.

Model photo created with AI. The printed line is real.

Ten minutes. That's all he needs. Shop the tee →

For going home and feeling different

"Things do not change; we change."

— Henry David Thoreau, Walden, "Conclusion" (1854)

Same house. Same tree. Same ornaments in the same box. But you're not the person who left. Thoreau's point: the place didn't move, you did. Shop the mug →

A small gift for the person who's dreading it most

You probably know who that is. A mug they can hold through the whole thing says I see you without anyone else noticing.

Not sure which line fits? Take Find Your Line and choose For someone else. Or browse the Quote Library.

If we can't verify it, we don't print it.

Questions we get

When do I need to order for Christmas?
We can't guarantee holiday delivery. For your best shot at Christmas, order by Thursday, November 26.

Can the mugs go in the dishwasher?
Hand washing is recommended. It keeps the print looking new longer.

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The Quoteiac Team: Posts with this byline are researched, written, and edited by different members of our team, each working from their own interests and strengths. Every quote is checked against its original source before it goes up.