Family traditions feel corny until the year you can’t go home for them.

Repeated family rituals look silly from inside them, mainly because they are familiar and slightly forced. Their job was never the event itself; it is that everyone returns to the same point on the calendar. That function only becomes visible in the year when returning turns out to be impossible.

Take part in the corny one this year without the commentary. Learn how it is actually done, since somebody is currently doing the work of keeping it alive. One day that work passes to you, and it is easier to carry something you paid attention to.