Over the River and Through the Woods

The day we call "Thanksgiving" is not far away. One could think that my celebrations of this day would be pretty much the same. I love the traditions of fixing the same foods, having the same conversations around the table, sharing the same feelings of gratitude every year but each designated Thursday gathering in November that I've experienced has memories all its own.

Thanksgiving had that "Over the River and Through the Woods" feel to it for me, as a child. We often had snow. Dad used a horse-drawn sleigh, his team's harness alive with sleigh bells, once snow accumulated. Mother didn't cook turkey, or goose, or duck for the meal. Her's was a simple meal. She cooked what she had--chicken. What I remember most was her pie and the dressing made from scratch using homemade bread, an uncooked egg or two, onion and sage. Once she had broth, made by boiling chicken gizzard, liver, and heart, she chopped the organ meats, then added this and the broth to the dressing, with the exception of the liver. That was hers to eat! She LOVED the chicken liver. She always drank the briny juice from canned olives, too. My sisters-in-law, Evelyn or Carma, made Parker House rolls. Mother made drop biscuits and bread but never rolls so those were a treat. I don't remember eating pumpkin pie or cranberry sauce until I left the farm. Mother's dessert for Thanksgiving was always Butterscotch Pie and sometimes her dad's favorite rag pudding served with a rich, caramel sauce or Evelyn's carrot pudding with hard sauce. Mother always set her table with a set of ruby red drinking glasses and matching water pitcher she'd been given by one of my brother's (I think). For years, I did, too, those very ones.

If Grandma South cooked a turkey, it had to be a fresh one from her favorite butcher. Nothing frozen would do! What she really wanted was a goose. Grandma had a way with potatoes. They were often lumpy but her family loved them. Having lived through war, standing in bread lines and often going hungry in her youth, she was a bit frugal in the amounts she cooked. As the family numbers at the table grew, the potatoes always seemed to run short. Judy and I, the in-laws, offered to help fix the meal but we would be waved off until time for the clean-up. One time, we plotted and got Grandma to let us peel the potatoes. You know what we did, of course. We peeled the entire 10-lb. bag or whatever it was! Grandma said nothing. I'm sure she realized it when her kettle would barely hold the lot of them. She cooked, she smashed, she served them up without a word, to her family and to her two, disobedient and extravagant daughters-in-law. Wouldn't you know that this would be the time when the demand for those white, lumpy mounds wasn't as great as it had historically been. We offered seconds, thirds, and more.

When my son, Todd, was just a baby, Frank and I went to my brother, Sylvan's in Chubbuck, Idaho for Thanksgiving, arriving late the night before. My 8-month-old child hadn't adapted to the change in his schedule so it was late when I got my fresh apple pies--my contribution to the meal--into the oven. As they baked, I fell asleep at the kitchen table, waking up to a cloud of smoke! The pies had bubbled over, creating mountains of black, crusty ash. The oven would have to cool before the mess could be cleaned up so I went to bed, intending to fix my mess before Carma, my brother's wife, started her turkey. Baby was fussy; I tried to keep him quiet; There was no sleep for any of us. I had just dozed off when I heard commotion in the kitchen on Thanksgiving morning. It was 5:00 am.  I was too inexperienced in holiday meal prep to know that the bird had to be started so early!  Carma went to put her turkey in and found an oven that couldn't be used until it was cleaned! After all these years, I still feel bad about that. Can you tell?

One of my favorite Thanksgiving get-to-gethers was probably the first one in our Salt Lake City home. We had no furniture, not even a kitchen table and only a tiny, apartment sized fridge in the basement, an old, old stove and no counter space to speak of. I invited all the nieces and nephews who were in the area attending college, my brother's--Sylvan and Marion--families, Frank's brothers and sister, their families, and the South parents for dinner. With borrowed card tables and chairs, my trousseau linens, dowry dishes and Grandma South's silverware, some guests were seated at tables in the living room, some brave souls juggled china and crystal while sitting on the stairs leading to the basement, others made use of the raised hearth in the 'great' room at the bottom of the stairs. I had such fun playing the part of a grownup!

MerLyn, my sister, and her family came for Thanksgiving our first year I think it must have been, in Sparks, NV. Her husband, Dennis, solved the space problem right away with a big sheet of plywood  set on top of my seats-six-if-you-don't-mind-sitting-cozy kitchen table.

So I was use to being with family for Thanksgiving meals, whether at the farm in Weston, at Marion's home in Preston, traveling to where family members were or gathering together as many as possible in our own home or at the South's on Commonwealth Avenue in Salt Lake City. Grandpa South always went around the table, asking each of us to express what we were most thankful for.  Whenever we came together in his house for a meal, whether it was Thanksgiving or a Sunday roast beef, before we could leave, he insisted on a chorus of hymns, "The Seer" and "A Poor Wayfaring Man", that reminded him of his grandfather, John Taylor.  Prayers were offered before the holiday meal, no matter where we were. Old family stories were repeated every year.    

The first Thanksgiving after the divorce was just plain awful. Frank took Todd and Jenn to Salt Lake City; I ate a TV dinner sometime during the day. I had no family close by. We hadn't lived here long. I had an invitation to join a family at their home but declined. I was so sad, hurt and angry, feeling betrayed and grieving the death of my marriage. I didn't want to put on a face or have to be good company. While my kids were out of the house and not present to witness or be frightened by my behavior, I wanted to wallow as much as I needed to and cry, scream, whatever, to let out what I had not yet been able to release. I embraced all the 'poor me' I could muster. I was not feeling 'Thankful' on that day.

Before another November passed, my neighbor, Dixie, and I had become friends, kind of "You go, girl!" buds. She was raising twins alone. Both of us were trying to regain our footing, keep a roof over our heads and feed our kids. We helped each other out here and there. It seemed a natural thing to create Thanksgiving together. Neither of us had money to buy anything special or extra for the meal. We would have to use what we already had. I volunteered to cook what meat I had. It wasn't turkey, I'm sure. And I had potatoes. She had said she wasn't much of a cook but she'd make gravy. I agreed. "Who can't make gravy?" I thought. Dixie wanted us to eat at her house so I carried my simple offerings across the street and down four houses, with my two kids in tow.  Her TV was blaring. She sat with us at the table long enough to serve her gravy--a clear container about half way filled with flour sludge with grease separated and floating like foam on beer, to fill the rest of the container right up to the rim. In the short time it took for us to eat what little we had to offer in our combined effort, Dixie ran about as much as the players on the screen, going back and forth from TV to table, back to TV and so on. No one said, "Pass the gravy".

Establishing new traditions required some experimenting. Being far away from any family had required some getting use to when we moved to Nevada but the feeling of being a bit stranded was intensified in those first weeks, months, and years of being on our own. The kids and I tried 'eating out' for Thanksgiving dinner one year when 'eating in' was just too hard, too emotional. We went to Harrah's Buffet in downtown Reno. The food was tasty. Once we got there and shook off our blue mood, the kids were well-behaved, people serving and those at other tables were friendly. There was a sort of 'family' feel to it all. An older 'Dear' pointed out the many choices of desserts to my kids. I lost count of how many tiny chocolate eclairs each of them ate. I was just hoping to get us all home before anyone got sick. It was lovely to be fussed over for a little while, and get out from under the ghosts of Thanksgivings past. However, we missed the smell of cooking the meal at home, as we had done when we were a 'family'. We missed having leftovers. We probably missed more than I'm remembering, given that I had spent the month's grocery money, eating out.

Sarah South Fenton, her husband and a whole houseful of kids moved to Reno, early 80's maybe.  Sarah is Frank's first cousin. I didn't know what to expect. I'd imagined that South relatives had crossed me off their list, being naturally supportive of their own kin, as wouldn't have been unusual in circumstances such as ours. I couldn't have been more wrong, where Sarah and Joe were concerned. They were thrilled to be invited to my house for meals and special occasions and they returned the favor. "We don't get many invitations; There are so many of us!" they said. A new chapter began, celebrating together at their house or mine. And so it was...such good times together for two or three years. Then Joe was transferred out of our area. He moved his family. It was Thanksgiving time again. I knew we'd really miss them. A day or so before the holiday, there was a knock on my door.  I opened it and there stood Joe, smiling from ear to ear, holding out a huge turkey to me. "I was just in the neighborhood and wanted to be sure you had one of these!" He had to have driven miles and miles outside his assigned territory to do such a kind thing for us.

"Over the river and through the woods, To Grandmother's house we go..."  This had been the case for lots of Thanksgivings. A few years ago, my grown children said they thought it was time to pass the torch. I got the feeling that they thought I'd put up a fuss about that but we were outgrowing my house and I had more difficulty lifting a 30-plus pound turkey in and out of the oven so my response was more of a "Hallelujah!" As the day of Thanksgiving grew closer, I began getting calls at work from one or the other, asking, "How do you do __?"  "Can I get the recipe for __?"  "So how much (how little, how long...) do I __?" The hosting gig came back to me within a couple of years. I continued for as long as I could but was both relieved and grateful when Jenn assumed that role. She does a great job. Todd, his wife, her sister and family have included all of us in their celebration in recent years, too. My grand-kids know their way around a kitchen. It could be one of them who makes the rolls and pies this year.

Many have shared a similar sentiment about Thanksgiving. "Not what we say about our blessings, but how we use them, is the true measure of our thanksgiving. --WT Purkiser. John F. Kennedy is quoted as saying: "As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them." I have much to be thankful for, not the least of which are the years of varied experiences in marking Thanksgiving Day. I can't be sure I learned the lesson provided by each one but surely it was there, had I recognized and taken advantage of it. We could agree, that it is about more than a plentiful, even gluttonous meal and yet the meal often serves as the vehicle that brings forward thoughts of gratitude and thankfulness in us, opens us up to opportunities for helping others, and softens us sufficiently to use our blessings in the best ways.

Thanksgivings...68 of them! They are a part of who I am.