Friday, November 25, 2005

On stuffing and other accompaniments...

Yesterday was Thanksgiving, and I was at work. Now, one of the hallmarks of healthcare is that a hospital operates 365 days every year (and 366 in leap years), so someone has to work. And this year, for Thanksgiving (and also for Christmas in about a month), one of those someones was me.

We actually had a quick and busy day at work, highlighted by a free cafeteria lunch for which I chose chicken tenders and fries. Our cafeteria is yummy, so I was quite pleased with my meal.

My parents and my sister went to Long Island to see my aunt, uncle, cousin, and canine cousin. Therefore, I got to eat dinner with Bill's for my first non-split Thanksgiving ever.

Bill's family puts on quite a spread. There is turkey and ham, potatoes and stuffing, broccoli with cheese sauce, corn, bread, yams, cranberry, and gravy. Dessert is an even larger spread...three different apple pies (Gram's traditional two-crust, Gram's crumb-topped, and Aunt Mary's crumb-topped, which I find to be the BEST PIE EVER!), two pumpkin pes (traditional and pumpkin custard), pecan pie, chocolate pudding pie, coconut custard pie, and pumpkin roll.

My family also puts on a spread...turkey, potatoes, stuffing, asparagus, peas, cranberry, sweet potatoes, coleslaw, and a smaller dessert display. And I missed it.

It seems like those two spreads have a lot in common. There are all the basics. However, some things are different. For example, this year's Thanksgiving had no coleslaw for me...and I missed it. And my family's stuffing is a darker variety that has sausage in it, while Bill's family's is lighter in color and meat-free. Now, don't get me wrong. I had a great Thanksgiving dinner yesterday...but I missed eating my traditional family foods as well.

So while I feel lucky to have another family to celebrate with on these pesky working holidays, I have to say that I will happily eat today the plate that my aunt sent home for me. And as I bite into that stuffing and tuck into some coleslaw, I will give thanks for all that I have...because that is what Thanksgiving is all about.

2 comments:

Gunngirl said...

I really enjoyed this blog... and it made me hungry. Boy can your family (ies) cook. Are they going to do it all again for Christmas?

Yummy!

hazel said...

mmmmmmmmmmmm

I have heard lots of people say they have cole slaw for t-giving. odd.

sean had to work on thanksgiving too. along with hospitals, cable companies must be open 366 days a year. if people can't watch tv, they will die - and that is more work for you at the hospital. so you can thank sean for helping try to keep the amount of people suffering from tv withdrawal in your ER as low as possible.