Grateful for flawed Thanksgivings
By Glenda Winders
NAPA VALLEY, Calif. — Every year I look forward to Thanksgiving, although sometimes I can’t for the life of me figure out why. It’s true that I take a few days off from work, get to see family, and eat, drink and laugh more than on an ordinary day, but the holiday has its drawbacks, too.
In fact, the reasons that make me look forward to the day are the same ones that fill me with dread. For one thing, a four-day weekend really isn’t time enough to make it over the river and through the woods for modern far-flung families. This means that throughout the country people who get off work or out of school on Wednesday afternoon must drive through the night like maniacs to arrive before dinner is served the next day. Flights have been sold out for months, and picking someone up at the airport is an exercise in patience and gridlock.
When I was teaching college classes, the day before Thanksgiving was a bust. Most of the students had already left to catch a plane or make the drive, and the few who remained were stuck with a film or time in class to work on an essay. When the university administration struck on the idea of canceling Wednesday sessions, the same thing happened on Tuesday.
For the person who prepares the celebratory meal this is no holiday. Even if the pies are made the night before, the official starting gun goes off early the next morning when someone still in pajamas tiptoes into the kitchen — praying all the way that the turkey has thawed — and slips it under its foil tent and into the oven. From then until dinnertime the steamy kitchen will be a-thrum with the clatter of bowls and utensils, the microwave will whirr and beep, the antique dishes will come out from the cabinet where they’ve been stored since last year.
If all goes well, a meal that has taken most of the day to prepare will come off at halftime and be gobbled down in a matter of minutes so the fans can get back to the game. Other family members, felled by a turkey-induced tryptophan stupor, will finish the day sleeping, while in the kitchen the same intrepid few who did the cooking will spend the rest of the evening cleaning up.
In our family the tradition has always been to accompany the turkey with carbohydrates – noodles, stuffing, mashed potatoes, yams, corn and homemade bread. Now that we know better, I recently suggested doing something healthy for a change, but it didn’t go well. My opinion was about as popular as the year I told them the original Thanksgiving didn’t happen exactly as it had in our grade-school textbooks.
My adult children recall that each year I have insisted that everyone at the table name something for which they are thankful. When they were small they rolled their eyes at each other as I repeated my litany of blessings, always with them at the top. Now that they sometimes host Thanksgiving in their homes, however, I notice they do the same thing.
My husband and I are both only children, but friends with siblings especially dread the bickering over minutiae that has been part of their lives since childhood, not to mention the political arguments now that they are adults. Then comes Black Friday, the one day of the year you can bet I won’t be leaving my house, and beyond all that, how many days can a normal person be expected to eat turkey sandwiches, three varieties of cranberry sauce and leftover gravy?
If you happen to be in another country on this distinctly American holiday, you can forget trying to celebrate. The year I lived in London the French waiter at the Russell Hotel told me he had never heard of Thanksgiving. While he thought it sounded quaint and enjoyable, he couldn’t help me out with a slab of pumpkin pie. I ended up having an omelet for dinner.
I’m not alone in my ambivalence about Thanksgiving, and lover of stories that I am, over the years I have asked people to tell me their Thanksgiving memories. More than the happy ones, people always remember the ones that went awry.
My daughter tells me that her hands-down worst Thanksgiving was when she was 5 years old and we had houseguests from out of town. The three children decided to put on a holiday pageant, but her brother and our friends’ little girl got to the feathers and makeup before she did. In the photographs from that day the “Native Americans” are smiling broadly. She is the grim little Pilgrim in a white apron and pigtails.
One person told me the Thanksgiving he remembers most vividly took place back in the ‘60s when the host and hostess ingested a mind-altering substance and became so mellow that they didn’t put dinner on the table until 2 o’clock the next morning. Another said there was no question about her worst Thanksgiving: “The year my boyfriend’s wife went into labor.” I didn’t know what to say after that.
A close friend told me he honestly couldn’t recall a bad Thanksgiving, but he could remember one that was especially good. He was a young Marine stationed at Camp Pendleton, only a couple of hours from home, but he pulled guard duty and couldn’t get away. His family packed up their dinner and took it to where he was, hoping to have a picnic. Instead, it poured down rain and they had to huddle and eat in the car. He says it was one of the happiest and most memorable experiences of his life.
Hearing his story reminds me again why I look forward to this holiday, even with all its flaws. For my children and theirs, still at the top of my list even though they are too far away to make it this year; for the grandson coming from college who wants steak and ice cream cake for dinner; for the sunny room in which I write and the husband who plays his cello while I do; for friends who tell me their stories and the opportunity for all of us to share our stories here at Napa Valley Features — for all of this good fortune I am beyond grateful.
Glenda Winders is a novelist, freelance writer and copyeditor for Napa Valley Features.
Delightful to read. Thank you.
Glenda, this is the most honest, well-written memory about Thanksgivings, with emotions pouring out of me while reading. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.