This week, my mailbox has been inundated with emails – Black Friday sales! Cyber Monday sales! Save 50% Get free shipping! Shop online!

It’s awesome, all of it. 

Okay, most of it.

I love sales as much as the next gal. (My favorite top-stitched black trench came from the $5 bin at a vintage store in Pittsfield Mass. Whee!) But something else is creeping me out this week: Emails about sales that start at midnight Thanksgiving. Friday at 3AM. Sales that end before most people have even finished their first cup of coffee and put away the gravy boats Friday morning.

They’re not targeted to college kids or guys waiting on line at the Apple store for phones at midnight. They’re targeted to families.  So what those messages are essentially saying is, leave your kids at midnight (or worse, God, take your kids with you), because $10 sweaters are calling!

What those messages are saying is that we have totally lost our shit, America.

I totally get the importance of saving money. I get that for some families, racing to the mall at 3AM knowing you could be trampled by a Black Friday stampede or worse, may be the difference between gifts and no gifts. What I don’t get are the retailers putting families in the position to have to make this choice. I’m talking to you Old Navy. I’m talking to you JC Penney and Kohl’s and Children’s Place and Toys R Us.

It stinks.

Friday is Friday, but tomorrow is Thanksgiving. It’s the best damn holiday of the year. We get to be with the people we love and hang out in jeans and eat a ton of stuffing and the only gift we give is ourselves. In my heart of hearts, I wish we could keep it that way.