Tomorrow
is Thanksgiving and today I'll be preparing the one item I am
responsible for this year...the dressing. It was the dressing and a
pie but my sister is joining us this year and she has volunteered to
bring the pie. I set the bread out to get stale day before yesterday and cubed it
last night and made the cornbread last night and set it out which I
had forgotten about until Marc asked me wasn't the cornbread supposed
to be stale too? Oh shit. I swear this happens every year. Anyway,
it will probably take me all day. It usually does but at least I
have a head start on the bread already being cubed and all.
We'll
be going to our daughter's house as we have for the last three years.
Before that they would all come to our house but now our son and
daughter-in-law refuse to come out here. There's always a reason
they decline the invitations, and not just Thanksgiving. It's easier
to just accept the reason on face value than to delve into the murky
underbelly which will only make everyone unhappy and so we travel in.
Growing
up, my family didn't do Thanksgiving. Mother's position was we're
just going to do the whole turkey dinner thing over again in a month
for Christmas and she wasn't of a mind to go through the trouble
twice though it's not as if she did the cooking for Christmas. We
had a maid/cook and another couple who would come in to serve the
dinner and clean up after Leila left. Instead we would spend
Thanksgiving weekend at the beach house that our parents had built
when I was about 13. Sometimes I think, surely we did Thanksgiving
at some point before that but I don't have a single memory of it but
then I don't have a great memory. There's lots of things I don't
remember about growing up that my sister does and lots of things in
my adult life that Marc does.
Thanksgiving
didn't become something until I had my own family. When the kids
were small more often than not we went to my mother-in-law's house
and as they got older we would host dinner now and then. I remember
one Thanksgiving we were having the family to our house and I was
sweeping the front steps when a car drove up and a group of people
from a local church got out with a big bag of food. I was a little
dumbfounded since, one, we weren't/aren't christians and two, I'd
never even been to that church, and three, we had a houseful of food
and were expecting a houseful of people. As it turned out, our
daughter had gone with her friend with whom she had spent the night
to some sort of church function (there's that bad memory again) and
she somehow gave them the impression that we were broke, poor, and
hungry and they put us on their needy families list. Well, we were
poor but we weren't broke or hungry and the kids never went without
anything they needed just some things they wanted. I thanked them
very kindly, refused the food, and suggested they divide my portion
up between the remaining deliveries.
I
guess I'd best get in there and get started.
That is going to be some good dressing. I'm about to go make my pies.
ReplyDeleteI've been putting on Thanksgiving for almost forty years but for the past few years, Lily has had it at her house. In some ways I love it- so much less stress. In other ways, I mourn for those times.
I'm with you on the memory thing. And the things I do remember seem so random.
Fortunately, or unfortunately, my wife loved to cook so there will be many temptations tomorrow. I hope you and your family have a very Happy Thanksgiving.
ReplyDeleteThat's the thing about holidays, the memories. The not so good ones, too.
ReplyDeleteHave good time and as I have no idea about Thanksgiving food apart from the turkey and pumpkin pie (?), what is a dressing and why use stale bread? Or is it what we would call a stuffing?
yes, same as stuffing only we don't stuff it in the turkey. don't know why it's called dressing. maybe because some people 'dress' the turkey with it on the platter? and I think the bread being stale helps it keep some 'body' after the chicken broth is added instead of becoming instant mush.
DeleteI have been saving bread to make stuffing, I like the bacon you will add, never tried that.
ReplyDeleteI cheated and used Pepperidge Farm's, although I added my own spices, celery, and onion.
ReplyDeleteThen again, I just finished prepping the potatoes, made three pies, and have a batch of oatmeal cookies in the oven. As my husband, who's never cooked a thing in his life, says - "think about being a kid and going to Grandma's house for homemade cookies." No guilt here at all.
I think as small children, we went to Ma's house for Thanksgiving because I remember Mother telling me that Thanksgiving was never her thing - it was her mothers.
ReplyDeleteI am impressed with the offer of food from an unknown church, and your solution of dividing it out among other families. I've come to terms this year with my family, and even have smiled. My daughter's mother in law called me, as she waited for my daughter and her son to pick her up for a trip to Fallingwater, Frank Lloyd Wright's home. We will get together before Christmas. And, my other daughter offered to bring me a plate of leftovers from her home, when she brings Laura home. Now, that's about as realistic as it comes. Our Bob Evans is in my neighbor's fridge, waiting the magic hour tomorrow. You have a grand day.
ReplyDeleteI was under the impression you and Laura had other plans, a road trip to see a friend, for Thanksgiving. or perhaps that is your christmas plan. I think I'd have declined the plate of leftovers, thank you very much. it's not about having a plate of food with specific holiday fare. best to be with friends than family that can't be bothered. Nice, I suppose, that Laura is invited. the reason my sister is joining us is that the only one of her children that lives near (others are out of state) is because her daughter can't be bothered to make sure her widowed mother is included in a family meal as the daughter is planning to spend the day with her boyfriend's family. we could do it on Friday, was her sop. no thanks, on the day or not at all.
DeleteHappy Thanksgiving, Ellen! We are going to my son's in Boston this year. We've starting rotating this holiday among family, which I love. As a child we always went to my grandmother's and it was a always fun to help her make a monstrous meal that took all morning to create and all evening to clean up after. I have been following the renovation of your studio and think it is a fabulous space. Enjoy your day off today;)
ReplyDeleteThis has to be the best Thanksgiving story I've read so far. It's a story. About Thanksgiving.
ReplyDeleteThank you.
This year, I did a turkey. It was easier that some of the other things I have done over the years. Just put in the over and wait.
ReplyDeleteI hope the dressing worked out well! I kind of like your Mom's unorthodox approach to Thanksgiving. In a way it IS silly to have big Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners only a month apart. My memory is iffy too. My brother always remembers things from our childhood in much more detail than I do.
ReplyDeleteSorry about the underlying issue that forces you to commute for the holidays. We are doing the same, but actually, I'm grateful. Although I still play matriarch and help whichever daughter do the bulk of the cooking, it's nice not hosting it, frankly. I'm getting too old for all the crap that goes with it. Hope you had a lovely holiday!
ReplyDeletewell, I don't really mind not having it here, like you say, all the crap that goes with it. I came home to a n ice clean kitchen.
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