Thanksgiving Fantasy

Do you have Thanksgiving coming up with gloating Republican family members? Go anyway, and if they start discussing politics quietly get up and leave. Don't say a word to the jerks, just thank the hosts for all the good food and leave. No need to engage with the jerks because that's what they want. If you politely leave, they'll get the message. It is important that they understand you are a person of substance, and you refuse to be abused.

Drive separately if your significant other doesn't choose to support you.

If the hostess calls you the next day to ask why you left, tell them you didn't feel like you belonged.

If you are the person who is hosting the event, you can get up and go to your room for the rest of the evening.

Enjoy!

Thanksgiving 2023

I'm trying to get into the right frame of mind for Thanksgiving, you know, the state where I want to clean and cook. It's getting late, so it better happen soon. Thankfully my husband cleans, and he's always game to make the turkey and mashed potatoes. I don't think I have ever made a turkey. I'm spoiled rotten.  

I would like to experiment with wild side dishes, but our daughter and her family have food issues. Our daughter has gluten issues that will make her sick in bed if I use wheat flour. Grandson N has a milk protein allergy and will spend his evening in the bathroom if I'm not careful. He's also extremely picky because so many foods have made him sick in the past. Granddaughter E is the foodie, but even she doesn't like onions. Neither does her father. I want ALL of us to be happy on Thanksgiving. 

I make two stuffings, one gluten free. I sauté onions and celery blended to high heaven with turkey broth before I bake this GF one. The other is made with cornbread and includes apples, pecans, onions, celery and mushrooms. Guess which one I eat? Gravy is made with gluten free flour, and it turns out just fine. I use cold water instead of milk. Tom and I are the only ones who will eat the cranberry sauce or the sweet potatoes. Everyone likes green beans. Butter doesn't have milk protein in it, so there's plenty of butter in or on everything. 

Grandson N will eat chicken nuggets and separately roasted potatoes. Don't judge me, he's my grandson and I'll make him whatever he wants. You be you. I'll be me.

Make me say it: I make fresh green beans for some, green bean casserole (with gluten free cream of mushroom soup and crispy onions) for others.  

Our daughter is in charge of dessert. She's a good baker, and sees it as her lot in life to adapt wheat based recipes to gluten free.Whatever she makes will be super damn yummy. 

In my mind, Thanksgiving is the best meal of the year. For all who celebrate, enjoy!

Last year's meal. Oh gee, I need to run to the store for
red beets, and apples to make applesauce. Aaaack. 
Granddaughter E LOVES red beets.

Thanksgiving 2019

I'm trying to get excited about Thanksgiving. It's a lovely holiday and deserves some of my time and attention. Other people's Thanksgiving posts have helped - many thanks for that. 

I need to break out of this bland and soothing convalescence and start feeling excitement and joy again. What is really motivating me is the realization that Thanksgiving memories at Grandma and Grandpa's for our two youngest grandchildren are up to us, since it is usually at our house. So, I will garner the courage to limp into the garage and unpack the good dishes. Why not?

While I'm at it, maybe I'll make the Christmas fruitcake this weekend.   

I'm thankful for the joy this holiday forces me to remember.  It feels good.

 

Our youngest grandson's "grateful plate" he made at school last year

Alright already, I cleaned.

This post is for my blog-friend Sabine, who is often the voice crying out in the wilderness. 

Baby Sister texted to thank me for posting about our mother, and we reminisced about childhood holidays. She remarked on the work Mom did to stage those holidays. She said how thankful she was Mom made the effort because it provided lovely memories. Baby Sister waxed poetically about pulling out Mom's good china and setting a beautiful table under Mom's direction. Sheesh.

My mother was a great cook, but a lousy housekeeper.  She's famous throughout our extended family for her messy house. So for her to summon up the energy to discard all the accumulated junk on her dining room table was a monumental act of love in itself.

Great, I thought to myself as I squirmed uncomfortably in my chair with the phone to my ear. Now in addition to cleaning like a crazy woman, I had to go through the boxes in the garage to find the good china?

I muttered a stream of swear words that would make a sailor's eyes pop out, pulled my lazy #%* off the couch to start cleaning the house and digging out the china. I made the effort not because I wanted to, but because my grandkids deserve Thanksgiving memories of a beautifully set table at their grandparent's house. The things we do for love, right?

Is that all? Well of course not! I'm a sneaky old woman and I'm leading up to something more important than cleaning; climate change. If we don't start making the changes to deal with this, there won't be a future for our grandchildren, great-nieces/nephews.

Why bother? Well, why bother breathing?!

Climate change WILL be at the top of the list for the new Democrat majority House of Representatives in the U.S.  While they deal with the big issues, we must muster the energy to overcome our cynicism and despair on the home front. We can start creatively imagining new ideas, new industries, alternate economies, better and more effective political strategies so there will a reasonable future for those we love.

Call me naive, but to me there is nothing more important right now than this: reuse, recycle, re-imagine, rethink, and redesign. Please make the effort.

Popeye would do it.  Bluto would not. Be like Popeye.

Do I have to clean my house for Thanksgiving?

I can't believe Thanksgiving is this Thursday. It is as if I went to sleep last July and then woke up this morning. What a wonderful and personally satisfying interlude this election cycle has been. I'm looking forward to more of the same in 2020. 

But now I have to come down to earth and face the cold hard truth. I'm going to have to clean my freakin' house in anticipation of a big family dinner. Let's just say the housework has been a bit neglected and a serious holiday cleaning is in order. Yikes. It will take me days. I better get crackin'.

I'm sure it is hard for readers outside the U.S. to understand Thanksgiving, unless you are Canadian. Then you have already been through yours and you know the drill. But the rest are probably wondering what's the big deal with this Thanksgiving thing, and why don't we just wait until Christmas for Turkey? I don't know. We just don't. We're American, for better or worse. 

Thanksgiving is a family-based holiday, but not commercialized or decadent like the U.S. version of Christmas has become. It is about food, memories, and love. Or at least that's what we tell ourselves. I bet a lot of the people who will celebrate on Thursday dread it like the plague because they will have to sit next to their mean-spirited aunt, or their racist father. Politics, religion, and unresolved emotional themes will ruin yet another family meal in some households. Oh well, as long as the food is good. It is really the best meal of the year.

I love Thanksgiving food. Thinking of mashed potatoes and turkey gravy, moist cornbread stuffing with nuts and dried fruit, homemade cranberry sauce, and all the rest make me happy. A special memory is my mother's pumpkin pie. Oh, Ma! I miss you so.

She never bought canned pumpkin. Nope, not my Mom. She bought small pie pumpkins, split them in half, cleaned out the seeds and baked the pumpkin in the oven before scraping it out and making the pie. THEE pie. The perfect pumpkin pie. It was totally different than one made with canned pumpkin. Hers was luscious; darker, complex, textured, better in every way.

Everything was usually made from scratch in her house, but certainly always on holidays. She would even make homemade bread for Thanksgiving. We topped it off with jellies and jams her and my father "put up" (i.e., canned) every August.

I have had dreams about her three times in the past two weeks. In truth, this is what the holidays really do.  They conjure up ghosts.

My mother in pink, 1988

Is it so wrong?

Sheesh, I can't believe we are really going to stage another relentlessly sunny Thanksgiving in flip flops and shorts. 

As the day approaches, I am finally going to admit I miss having Thanksgiving in the frozen north lands where it is weather appropriate for the season. No, I do not want to move back. I am done with white knuckle driving and shoveling snow. I just wish I could occasionally spend Thanksgiving  there, and see my old friends.

This is our 4th Thanksgiving in Florida. The first three years we ate like civilized people in the dining room. The first two we even used our good china. Last year, meh! Bring out the white Corning Ware. It's Florida casual, now. I may NEVER haul out that good china again.

In fact, this year we are having Thanksgiving out by the pool in the lanai. I am looking forward to it. It is the best  time of the year in Florida. However, I miss a cold-weather Thanksgiving in a house with a wood stove and lots of candles. I can't help it. That's what I am used to.

If we are giving thanks at this time of the year, then I am thankful for the life I have lived. It has been jam packed with both joy and sorrow, which is to say it has been quite full. As I get older I notice the quiet moments are often swarming with memories. I have to wonder, is it so wrong to yearn for the past?

Paying homage to my friend JE's Challah.  A powerful Thanksgiving memory.