Thanksgiving Blessings

By the time you’re reading this, Thanksgiving will be upon us. Everything that always happens to me because of my amazing flare for the dramatic, will be a thing of the past. Stories, that will be told at the Thanksgiving table as we all proceed to eat more than we can comfortably stand. In between bites I will tell of my hysteria when I ran out of one thing or another, forgot to buy this, that or the other, and how I completely forgot that I had planned to make this dish or that.

Because that’s who I am. I’m a planner to a fault. I make lists. I am still that crazed-looking woman roaming up and down the aisles of Winn Dixie, the store I shop at most every week, looking for items that I don’t normally purchase; therefore, I look lost as heck trying to find them.

Then I spend at least ten minutes of what seems like HOURS trying to remember the difference between baking power and baking soda. You can always tell the non-bakers on the aisle with all the baking items. They, like me, are standing in front of one section after another, with furrowed brow, cell phone in hand, trying to decide when has it been an appropriate amount of time to declare defeat, wave the white flag of surrender, and just call Mom – the expert.

I can’t remember too many years since holiday dinners were passed down to me, that a call has not been made from the baking aisle. Every time, before leaving the house, I think I have myself and my notes together and that they are comprehensible. They never are.  

Speaking of which, do any of you remember the first year the holiday dinners became your responsibility? My gracious in Heaven, what a sideshow all of that seemed to be. I had recipes, I had directions; but confidence – nary a bit. I mean, what’s the big deal? It’s only dressing, the same dressing recipe that has been cooked in my mother’s family since the beginning of time. Her mother made it, she made it, and now here I am hoping not to make a mess of it. No pressure. You would think if you just follow the directions it would be snap! Well, I’m here to tell you all right now, nothing is EVER a snap for me. Those older generations cooked some by measurements, but a lot of it was by taste, and by the “jiggle” of it. Not too loose, not too firm, brown but not dark brown on top, etc. My friends, I’m here to attest to the fact that everybody’s jiggle just ain’t the same.

Somehow, it always seems to come together, even if most of the time I am secretly hoping that the beauty from my holiday table-setting, along with the sweat on my brow and the top of my lip, will distract somewhat for any cooking faux pas that passes someone’s lips.

I’ll of course, regale you later with stories of how it all really went down – but until then – blessings to you and yours, and a Happy Thanksgiving  to all.