It was all about friends, family, and food.
We arrived mid-day on Wednesday, and my MIL was either making one of her famous soups or preparing her famous apricot chicken for dinner.
Thanksgiving morning started with bagels from Bialy’s, smoked salmon and cream cheese. Then MIL and SIL started preparations for the feast, and FIL, Hubster, and I retreated to the family room. You didn’t want to get in the way of those two when they were cooking or fighting about the cooking.
Dinner was served around 5pm. There was no lunch that day. You didn’t go near the kitchen. We would all be hangry. MIL would put out a relish tray to keep us from gnawing our hands off from starvation about an hour before we sat down for the meal. The guests would also be arriving. Cousins and friends of my in-laws, usually at least a half dozen guests. Most of them were in their late 70s and early 80s, but they were all vibrant, interesting, hilarious people. The most fun I’ve ever had at a holiday dinner.
We ate and ate and talked and talked. After a while..hours..MIL cleared our plates away and put on the coffee. We would all go to the kitchen and help clean up from the meal, then troop back to the table for dessert which was usually pumpkin pie and one of SIL’s famous cheesecakes. By then, it was 8-9pm. We ate pie and cheesecake, drank coffee, and talked and laughed still more. Dinner usually ended between 10 and 11pm. I’m not too ashamed to say I fell asleep at the table more than once.
The next day, we had bagels for breakfast and leftovers for lunch. Hubster and I hung out at the house while MIL and SIL did the Black Friday thing. They would always bring home a couple of pizzas from Geraci’s for dinner.
Saturday was SIL’s turn to shine in the kitchen. She would make a huge pan of lasagna (I swear it was a hotel kitchen sized pan), and we had yet another dinner party for cousins who were not there for the holiday and SIL’s friends. More cheesecake. Another night of falling asleep at the table for me. So. Much. Fun.
We did this every year for fifteen years, until MIL and SIL’s health began to decline. We offered to make dinner, but they decided to spend the rest of their Thanksgiving holidays with friends. We stopped going up for Thanksgiving. The first year, we went to the movies and cried.
Now, Hubster and I co-host dinner for friends. It’s a lot of fun, there’s a lot of good food. But no more cheesecakes, no more six-hour feasts, and no more family. Just memories to cherish.
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