How I said "Thank you"

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November 23, 2006 marked my second year abroad during a major American holiday...thanksgiving. The first was cute. It was back in ´02. There was a boy in a city in a country called Spain. I liked to kiss him. We made lasagna (my favorite food) and Carlos had weird "los mormones" statues which strangely looked like pilgrams....and NOT Mormons. We put candles next to the the lasagna, and Los Mormones next to the candles. We sat in Carlos´s kitchen and had my first Thanksgiving away from home....I fell in love with it....being away for Thanksgiving. I loved bringing a tradition of mine to someone else...and for the first time, with a boy I was thankful for, eating a food I was thankful for, and, oddly, having statues of pilgrams I was thankful for.

This year was number two and I again was getting excited. I was invited to share a Thanksgiving dinner with some friends and their classmates and their classmate´s friends. Every year the students in their grad program rent out a restaurant for the night. The restaurant is given recipes for making a turkey, and stuffing. They made mashed potatoes, salad and wine. We brought the rest.

This year wasn´t as sweet as the time before. This Thanksgiving I thought a lot about what I was thankful for but it was in a slow and painful sort of way. I thought back through the past 9 months and all the amazing things I have seen and done...and I was thankful for them. I thought a lot about my family. For the first time realizing how split apart, splintered and damaged we are now. Last year Thanksgiving was so close to my parents seperation that taking in family was just something I did. Not really realizing what it meant to not have everyone together. But this year was different. Mom is in Indiana, Lew at home (but he eats raw foods now....and that is NO way to celebrate Thanksgiving) with Kaili, Chris...who knows where. I also thought a lot about my sweet little besties, Serena and Mariah. A couple of years back they were adopted into my family and have been sharing Thanksgiving with us for sometime now.....where were they on Thanksgiving? Not in my hot little kitchen whipping up pies and cookies with me.

As I was baking for Thanksgiving I realized I didn´t have the same support group I used to have. But then F2 called right after I had to thrown away my second pie crust and took me out for a beer, and Erin came over as I threw away my third pie crust and helped me with my fourth....a cookie crust (EXTREMELY GOOD!). And so as Erin and I walked into the restaurant and saw faces that lit up when they saw us I knew I was thankful for the new family I am building.

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Photos

My dinner plate
My parents always told me my Thanksgiving plate was too white...and this one is to, but this year it wasn´t my fault. I was one of the last to eat....and all the color had been eaten already

friends
(front to back) Erin, Brian, and Quin

brian andç quin
they live together

quin
eating my calabaza cookie crusted pie

Comments

[mark]

hey stranger
I´m sorry that this was a difficult thanksgiving for you, it is a hard time of the year for a lot of people. But if it makes you feel any better I think you deserve to be thankful for your skills as a writer. Good luck with everything.

[toni]

holiday
its been awhile since i came here, to your travels and so there are a few things ive realized about it. 1-its really comforting 2-whenever and wherever you return to the states to do whatever you please, this is the most amazing resume ive ever read/seen. hopefully you'll stay in the written word. of course its more ... much more than just a resume... im jus sayin. 3-youre really great. and as trite as it may seem (being that we met so briefly and under stoopid circumstances) i MISS YOU! p.s. that polka'dotted dress is one hot number!

[Scott]

good to know
it is great that you're building more/new family in new places. My mom and I cast off "family" thanksgiving years ago, but there was time where I had built my own little family and those were the best thanksgivings ever. I don't really go in for the hokey of Thanksgiving, but it is pretty rad to actually realize that you have something to be thankful for and have a chance to celebrate it.

[LEW]

Thanksgiving!
I remember the thanksgiving last year it was so much fun being with your friends here in Washington. But you are correct we all have to move on and away from the family that raised you. We arn't as fractured as you may think we all care for each other a great deal.