#26 - The Thanksgiving Feast
Thanksgiving was pretty good this year - very good actually; we ate a turkey. We also ate mashed potatoes, squash, onions, turnips, peas and stuffing, everything awash in a wonderful gravy. And we ate cranberries and olives and nuts and celery sticks and rolls, and we drank wine. There were dips and cheeses and lots of laughing conversation. After all that, we had half a dozen pies to choose from and bowls of fruit and more cheese to go with them. And then we drank coffee and sampled mints. It was great.
And then we all laid down wherever we could and died a kind of mass, gastric “death.” Those on the couches stroked their bloated, grumbling stomachs with both hands while groaning kids rolled around on the floor in front of the fireplace. The expanse of the feast table appeared a wasted battlefield, strewn with the litter and offal of holiday gluttony. But it was great! It really was. So, I for one consider myself very fortunate to have taken part.
Thanksgiving is alone among our festive holidays in that its primary focus seems to be one big feast at which we endeavor to eat everything we can think of that’s good to eat, and we generally do, or as I said, die trying. Perhaps I have been missing the point all these years, but I find all the talk about the pilgrims with their blunderbusses a distraction as I try to hang on to my drumstick, come up with a plan on how to remove seven olive pits from my mouth without anyone seeing, and all as I attempt to slather butter on a Parker House roll. Meantime, the dog is hungering somewhere under the table near the kids where the pickings are likely to be good (she's no fool), and the cat of course, out of sight in the kitchen, his mind reeling with the sight and smell of a beautifully roasted bird twenty times his size, is evilly weighing the consequences of leaping onto the counter. It's quite a scene.
EAT is what we do in our house on Thanksgiving Day, but it certainly is not to stay alive. Historical precedent aside, in my mind it is a celebration of the new winter coming upon us, a season of icy crystals and spectacular light, clear air and hunkered-down nights by the fire to repay us for those days spent at the woodpile. This morning I found that miracle of bright, black ice on the pond, not yet strong enough to hold me, but a true window on the silent life below. With new snow on the way, I will soon know again who has come and gone, in which old stump a deer mouse lives and where a grouse spent the night. The richness of this good country is best measured in the days ahead; despite the frigid branches clicking in the wind, the wealth of its warmth and wonders and palette of colors stays with us. What better reason do we need for a thankful feast?