A leaky kitchen faucet and a sharp-toothed squirrel thwarted our plans to host this year’s Thanksgiving feast. As I write this, Tony sits at home, waiting for plumbers who are four hours late. Tradespeople are rare commodities in Vermont. Chimney techs arrived on time, climbed onto our roof and, at $350 per hour, reported that we needed a special part that will take two weeks to arrive. 

We have no kitchen sink. We’ve been managing, washing utensils in a downstairs bathroom. Hosting, with its mass of plates, glasses, forks, knives and spoons would overload current facilities. Yes, this is a First World inconvenience.

We have no blazing fireplace. Incisors are chisel-shaped teeth whose Latin root means “to cut.” A snarky squirrel used his incisors to cut through the metal grating atop our chimney, build a penthouse suite, and render our gas fireplace unsafe. Today’s rodent move out date has been postponed, imposing yet another inconvenience.

Thanksgiving is a beloved holiday in our family. Football is not really our thing. Call us un-American. (We still love our friends who love football.) We follow a “hike before feasting” model. We start our holiday with a morning jaunt, usually to Texas Falls in Hancock. This year we’ll walk the trail at Indian Brook. I’ll pack a picnic lunch of fresh mozzarella sandwiches with tomato and homemade pesto, tortilla chips, apples and hot chocolate. I always bring a candle for ambience and, sometimes, warmth. We’ve done this in sun, rain, sleet and snow. 

Our menu is planned in advance. Homemade cranberry-orange relish, sweet potatoes with a hint of maple syrup, garlicky mashed potatoes, and a baked vegetarian “roast” of seitan and stuffing topped with delicate puff pastry populate are beloved dishes. Our friends will prepare a “real” turkey, veggie side dishes and assorted pies and baked goods as we gather to celebrate. We’ll make real whipped cream the old fashioned way, choosing pure creaminess over added sugar. And there will be questions, dinner questions to tease out stories!

Thanksgivings past, from my teen years, found my parents, sisters and me working in a restaurant on Turkey Day. Taking the day off was NOT an option. Failing to show up meant losing your job. I remember arriving early, by 11:00 a.m., at the former Jimmy’s Allenhurst Restaurant in Danvers, Massachusetts. We’d set up the dining room, prep tables, check sugar bowls and salt and pepper shakers, and fill ice buckets in the bar for so many Shirley Temples – Thanksgiving is a family holiday, after all! Jimmy, our boss, was a Greek restaurateur who fed staff only on holidays and, for Thanksgiving, it was prime rib. Doors opened at 12 noon, releasing a hungry herd, folks who preferred to “eat out” on the holiday. The race was on to feed and flip as many tables as possible while customers downed turkey with all the fixings and chose from among pumpkin, apple and pecan pies. I mastered fast walking across the dining room to clean, clear and reset tables. I returned home with tired feet and a bit of grease on my white blouse from shoulder-carrying heavy trays to and from the kitchen. Should I mention that smoking was allowed in restaurants at the time? I shudder when I think of all the secondhand smoke my parents, sisters, and I inhaled. My family celebrated Thanksgiving that evening or, more likely, on the following Saturday afternoon before resuming our evening shifts at the restaurant.

On this Thanksgiving, I am grateful to be home in beautiful Vermont with Tony. I am grateful that my daughter and her partner are traveling to join us. I am grateful we have a roof over our head, money for groceries, and a shared love of cooking. I am grateful I don’t have to work on the holiday. I have genuine respect for those who do work on the holiday, by choice, by threat of losing their job, or by sheer financial need. Finally, I am grateful for our friends who allowed us to shift festivities to their home given our leaky sink and squirrel situations. 

“Of course you can come here,” they said. “You are like family.”

Of course.

Wishing you and yours a day of gratitude and good food wherever and with whomever you mark the day.

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