Holidays are complicated.
This is absolutely a cliche, so much so that it can seem like an off-handed acknowledgment that allows the complications to be brushed aside. Nonetheless it is true. Holidays change as we get older. Children grow up, adults grow older, people move, babies are born, people die. An empty space changes the celebration.
Personally, I’ve always loved Thanksgiving above any other holiday, and I know many if not most Americans share the sentiment. A friend who works with an international organization recently related that she needed to school her overseas colleagues on how little they should expect from American employees and clients this week.
I’ve known several immigrant families who immediately embraced Thanksgiving, finding it was a tradition that made them feel quintessentially American, even if their turkey was basted in soy sauce and served alongside mushrooms and noodles (delicious, by the way). On the other hand, a friend also related that her immigrant mother–whom I know to have loved America and many things American–did not “do” Thanksgiving. Her mother did not cook, and also, she just didn’t get it. This friend’s Thanksgiving memories are of going to the movies and ordering pizza, which sounds lovely, in its own way. I told her that she wasn’t alone, which she doubted, until she went to the gym Thanksgiving morning expecting to have a swim lane to herself and found it crowded with fellow Thanksgiving refugees.
My own memories of Thanksgiving growing up are warm and fond. I remember the day and the preparations and the leftovers more than the Turkey dinner itself; but I certainly enjoyed the dinner, too! I remember there were pastries set out in the morning, and cheeses and summer sausage and olives and crackers appeared at some point, and then we ate relatively late. My mother cooked all day, and I learned to help somewhat over the years. I became a good cook, and my one superpower now is that I know my mother’s bread and corn bread sausage stuffing, which is more “feel” than recipe. It’s chock full of nuts and cranberries and raisins (or not) and onions and celery and carrots and herbs. I remember there was a fire all day. I remember reading on the floor by the fireplace, a week’s worth of the New York Times strewn about, and usually a novel close to hand. Our small fluffy gray dog pittered and pattered between the hearth and the kitchen. The television was mostly off, except for the parade. Oftentimes my brother, sister and I went for a walk somewhere with my dad. There was always a “regular grace, plus special thanks” prayer and a toast to the cook before eating, which I remember with great sentimentality.
My sister remembers the same things, with a slightly different tone. She remembers the day as somewhat formal and stuffy, and I suppose it was. She says we dressed up–I’m not so sure, but we certainly never spent the day in pajamas. The old silver and the good china came out, and many little compote dishes for two kinds of olives and two cranberry sauces and crudites, and every dish had its own special spoon or fork. We ate by candlelight. We had to stay at the table longer. She remembers my mother being stressed out and often spending part or all of the next day in bed. She suspects my dad took us on walks so she could have enough peace to finish cooking. My sister and I now agree that the day was probably a rather lonely one for our mom, who came from a big, raucous Midwestern family with multiple generations and aunts and uncles and cousins first and second-removed. It must have been strange to find herself in New York with a nuclear family of three small children and a husband whose most useful help was to leave for a few hours; meanwhile, she worked to arrange a feast to fit the Victorian silverware. My sister recalls being jealous of friends who could spend the day in their pajamas, watch television, skip the prayera and dig in before it was dark enough for candlelight.
This is all true, and complicated, like the origins of Thanksgiving itself.
The three-day harvest celebration of the Pilgrims and the Wampanoags is, of course, one origin story–the feast, we all know, preceded and followed by territorial wars that in time became nearly genocidal for Native Americans. It is a somewhat strange celebration story. What is even stranger and more complicated to me, something I was ignorant of until this year’s traditional Thanksgiving day reading, is that the American holiday is far more grounded in the Civil War. It began in northeastern states, was enacted as state holidays by northern-state governors as a morale booster during the Civil War, and became a national holiday declared by Lincoln in the middle of the war in 1863. Part of the thanks being given was for the tide turning towards the Union side, but it was also declared a national holiday, explicitly promoted by Lincoln to encourage healing between North and South. Today it is celebrated as fervently in Southern states as in the North, and the Mayflower narrative prevails.
My adult Thanksgivings have mostly been pleasant, usually spent with dear friends. Some feasts were on paper plates on TV trays in front of football, some at candlelit tables, some suffused with not-my-family’s tension, and others joyfully relaxed and informal. One regular version offered a “Festive Fish” option (which I appreciated, as in these years I was also invited to a later meal of heavier fare). Since it wasn’t home, the stuffing was never quite right, and sometimes a day later I made my own to scratch that itch, but I never had a bad meal.
Thanksgiving became more complicated for me after the deaths of my parents a number of years ago. This was followed by the isolation of COVID, which kept me from celebrations with friends. More recently, the loss of my brother and my relocation to a very different place, far away from friends and remaining family, have added another layer of complexity. These recent Thanksgivings have been sad, even with many blessings to still count.
I am happy to say that my Thanksgiving this year was lovely, with a morning spent reading and most of the day and evening spent on the phone with family and friends while I noshed on cheese and salamis and olives. My friend who doesn’t do Thanksgiving “did Thanksgiving” with me over the phone, and we outlined a novel while we sipped wine and nibbled. We’re sure it will be a runaway hit and sell movie rights. We agreed to meet in Vegas next year, to visit her mother and see nostalgic icon Barry Manilow in residence there. Later in the day, I solidified plans to spend Christmas with my sister, and my stuffing superpowers have been requested. It occurs to me that a successful adult holiday is made of part childhood recollection, part adult knowledge, and part what you make of it.
I couldn’t feel more thankful or hopeful, even though as I write this, I am choked with nostalgia.
Holidays are complicated.
