Let's Dish

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday of the year.  No presents--just family, food and gratitude.  A winning combination.

A set of new dishes makes everything taste better. That's the excuse I allowed myself for the "green light" to the cash register.   I had them stacked at the counter before I had time to change my mind.  Perfect. 



Lots of things have to happen before the turkey is ever violated and stuffed into the oven; important things (like getting my hair done).  I had my head in the bowl as the stylist was washing and working her magic on me when a guy, half my age, sat down in the next chair.  He began asking his stylist, the expert, what Thanksgiving was all about anyway.  He thought it had something to do with the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria.  She was pretty sure that was close but that Indians were somehow involved.

After trying not to listen to the bantering and the outrageous guessing, I sprang into action.  Bolting upright, with shampoo suds running down my face and clothes, I put the karate chop on both of them as I glared and spat, "I can't take it anymore.  Here's what Thanksgiving is all about."  I mentioned Plymouth Rock, the Mayflower, pilgrims and their escape from religious persecution, Jamestown, starvation and death in the colony, harvest, God, Indians, and added tidbits about crops, cultivating, and the foods that would have been served.  "Oh," said the guy not taking any personal responsibility,  "you must have gone to Powers.  I went to Grand Blanc."   "No," I corrected, as I shot him the skunk eye, "I went through the Chicago Public School System in the 1970's and paid attention."

Focus

Think happy thoughts.

 Back to the dishes and the decorating. 

John, our oldest son who resides in the Big Apple, is turning 30 years old next month and I took the opportunity, with the whole family present, to sneak in a birthday cake

and a boisterous round of 

"Sto Lat" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYTK9im4dyc 

 

THE BIRTHDAY CAKE

What goes into a birthday cake?

Sift and stir, and beat and bake

A cake that must be grand and fine

For a great big boy of nearly nine!

"What will he be when he grows up?"

High hopes are raised on the rolling board!

Fond, foolish memories that mothers hoard,

And love too full for a measuring cup!

Quick fear for the hurts the future holds,

Fierce anger, too, for the men of might

Who leave a world of pain and fright

As a heritage for nine-year-olds!

What goes into a birthday cake?

Sugar and salt, and smiles and tears,

Butter and eggs, and hopes and fears.

Sift and stir, and beat and bake;

That's what goes into a birthday cake!

~Victoria Chase