ManicDDaily

When I think of my childhood Thanksgivings, I think of heat—the torrid kitchen with its blasts from oven and stove, the shaking of the slightly burned fingers of grown women who, in the heat of the moment, touched a still-baking roll or potato to ascertain “doneness,” the steam shooting up from a skillet, as if from a manhole cover, of boiling celery, onions, and the one or two sticks of real butter that my mother allotted us during the course of the average year.  (Fears of heart disease and ignorance of trans fat made us a strictly margarine family except, oddly, in the case of turkey stuffing.)

I think of the red patches on my Aunt Ginny’s otherwise pale cheeks.  She spent almost every Thanksgiving of my childhood with us and was a real jump-into-the-breach cook.  (An oldest child, she’d take over the kitchen even when there was not a breach.)

I think of my mother’s mounting tension both with the meal and her sister.  (My aunt focused on food; my mom liked things “nice.”)   Even when my aunt was not around to help cook, my mother, at a certain juncture in the meal prep, would lose herself in elaborate table decorations, mixing greenery (autumnal) with an assortment of glassware, figurines, assorted holiday tableware.

But the heat I think of mainly relates to the temperature of the food.  This was a priority for my mother—getting everything on the table while still piping hot, but not yet overcooked; making those of the male persuasion break away from televised football; squeezing people into the jammed-together furniture with some expedition and no accidents; finally, finally, getting my dad to rush though the heartfelt hem-haw of the prayer,  all before the gravy congealed.

Serving food as hot as my mother wanted (which required steam to emanate) was a nearly impossible task, even though she applied herself full bore.  “Is this hot enough?… shouldn’t I reheat that gravy?” were not only standard Thanksgiving repartee but an ongoing source of discord.   (The addition of wine, with its concomitant notion of savoring, would have been useful.)

Part of my mother’s obsession was a kind of perfectionism.  But what made the task so difficult (aside from the football game) was the sheer number of dishes.   A working mother, she felt an intense pressure to prove her ability to accommodate, to please those both present and absent, to perform.

As a result, there were not only sweet potatoes, but mashed (white–she called them Idaho) potatoes.  There was not only cole slaw, but lettuce with two types of gelled aspic—tomato and cranberry.  There was not only turkey stuffing made with dried fruit, but also stuffing made without dried fruit;  not only a roast turkey, also a roast ham; not only gravy but a mustardy rain sauce (for the ham),  not only peas, but broccoli and, depending on who was there, creamed corn or creamed onions; not only gravy but cooked cranberry sauce, canned jellied cranberry, raw cranberry-orange relish and pineapple (for the ham); not only white rolls but pumpernickel, not only dill pickles but sweet gherkins, pickled onions, herring, rye crisps, cheese, sour cream, chives (she’d sometimes throw in some white baked potatoes); not only pumpkin pie, but mince meat pie (sometimes also pecan or apple);  not only whipped cream but cool whip.  Coffee, ginger ale, punch.

With so much pleasing going on, her patience was bound to be short.  I don’t remember that many true arguments, but I do know that you had better tell her, repeatedly, (i) that everything was plenty hot, and (ii) that the question of food heat was a very important one.  (Oh yes, and the turkey hadn’t dried out.)

The stress of the day itself made the day after feel especially blessed—those leftover turkey sandwiches, that now soggy cole slaw, that buttery turkey stuffing, tasted especially good when eaten straight from the fridge.

Happy Thanksgiving!

(PS- Just want to say that as a working mother (or mother, period), I now have a great deal of sympathy for my mom.  I’m not quite sure how she did it all, only know that she did.)