The tap-tap-tapping of a woodpecker hammering at frozen suet wakes me.
Outside my window, a blanket of snow covers the ground, but sun shines bright and a sparkly thin sheet of ice glistens on Devil Track Lake.
Today I will move the frozen turkey from the freezer to the refrigerator so it can begin its long process of defrosting. I will peel and cook a sweet potato/marshmallow dish and boil cranberries into a ruby red sauce. I’ll think about polishing the silver.
But for these few precious moments, before the household wakes up, as the sun edges above bare treetops in the southeastern sky, I take a few moments to reflect on Thanksgivings of the past.
My childhood memories rank first since my mother’s delicious turkey and gravy were unsurpassed. As a tenyear old, I spent the whole day enjoying the rich aroma of roasting turkey that filled the house. True, Mom forced a few chores on me, but mostly I waited to eat. No child was happier than I when our company arrived, we gathered around the dining table, and Dad gave thanks. No one was happier than I to dig into my fully loaded plate, and it’s no surprise that all my childhood Thanksgiving memories include a stomachache at the day’s end.
The memory of my first turkey roasting experience comes to mind. As did many novice chefs, I neglected to extract the giblets from the raw bird and when the finished bird was pulled from the oven, found a paper covered, fully cooked packet of liver and gizzards.
My gravy making results were pitiful—one measly cup. The bottom of my roasting pan was not filled with succulent drippings like my mother’s. I could not figure out how it was humanly possible for my mother to find enough drippings for the bowls of brimming gravy she placed on the table.
I eventually abandoned all turkey fixing instructions but my mother’s slow roasting technique and was delighted to see my gravy output increase exponentially.
The first holidays without either my son or daughter also come to mind; my daughter calling from San Francisco, newly arrived with no time to make friends and forced to eat at a local diner, isn’t one of my happiest memories. A similar situation occurred with my son, when he first moved out to Salt Lake City. He called on Thanksgiving Day from a motel while waiting for the delivery of his holiday meal—a pizza. I later discovered the motel at which he stayed had been the site of a double homicide the previous year.
Better Thanksgiving memories come from the year Dick and I hosted a foreign exchange student from Germany. Natascha was new to the whole experience and watched with fascination as I struggled with a twenty-two pound turkey, emptying the giblet packet, washing and seasoning the interior and it with dressing and finally shoving the huge thing into the oven where it spent the day slowly roasting. Maybe I was a bit of a show-off but it was fun to see her try cranberry sauce, turkey and dressing for the first time in her life.
On this lovely November morning, I muse about the upand coming holiday. It will be quiet and small but filled with thanks for good health and an abundant life, and that’s all a person can ask for.
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