Beware the cost of a ‘Turkey Drop’

Turkey Drop? Someone might have broken up with you recently, or you might have been the one doing the breaking. Either way, ‘tis the season!

The so-called “turkey drop” is the unfortunate practice of breaking up right on the eve of Thanksgiving and the holiday season.

You can’t really blame people who do this. The holidays stir the emotional cauldron so vigorously, and they just make you think about marriage and domestic life.

You’re at your childhood home, once again tied to Mom’s apron strings while she cooks the turkey. You and your parents go up to the attic and take down all the holiday decorations and begin to set them up.

If you’re in my house, your parents talk at length about who they want to get which Christmas ornament when they die, but hopefully you don’t get that too.

But it’s more than that. This string of holidays has been given romantic overtones, especially since the movie “Love Actually” came out.

Plus, all the holidays are a package deal. If you don’t break up with someone before Thanksgiving, you’re stuck with them through Valentine’s Day. The prevailing thought is that the only thing worse than breaking up before Thanksgiving is breaking up between then and New Year’s.

Now this might sound like a callous way of thinking about breaking up. But there isn’t any better way to think about it.

There’s never a good time to break up. Everyone says that, and it’s true.

But there certainly are especially bad times to cut the knot, and no one will disagree that Dec. 15 would be one of those times.

We always think of the holidays as a time to bring people together, but it’s the same token that causes people to break up.

You think about all the people you want to see and be with over the holiday. If your boyfriend or girlfriend isn’t on the list … then it’s turkey drop time.

These considerations both just look at the perceived cost in the relationship.

You have a large chunk of time over the holidays. You’re going to have to spend a lot of that time with your significant other.

That time spent will be a cost either way, but if you’re going to be in a worse mood because of the time, then the cost just went up.

However, there’s another cost to think about, and that is paid by the other person in the relationship.

Negative feelings sustained by the other person will probably be greater if you break up after the holidays, because the time you spent together you were essentially pretending.

But both people will pay a cost in bad feelings whenever the break-up occurs.

It’s just a matter of who is willing to step up and perform the deed.

And a matter of when they are going to do it. If the answer to the second question is right before Thanksgiving break, then you might want to look into getting your Turkey Drop certification.