For Thanksgiving, my mother would buy a huge turkey, one barely able to fit into the big roasting pan and then squeezed into the oven. She’d set the alarm for the ungodly hour of 3AM to start her preparations for the big day: homemade stuff from scratch, her special cloverleaf rolls, and, of course, the star of the show, the turkey. She was proud of her homemade stuffing and rightly so, to be truthful. She used slightly stale bread as the base, melted butter and I don’t even remember what else, but it smelled so good when she was making it that I’d wake up from a sound sleep.
She’d stuff the turkey, then put it in the oven to slowly bake for hours. By about the three hour mark, the whole house smelled like buttered turkey and it was torture waiting for that bird to finish cooking. An hour before the turkey was ready, she’d make the cloverleaf rolls, carefully rolling one-inch balls, three to make a roll, all of them set into the greased muffin tins. The turkey came out of the oven to cool down and the rolls went in, adding their own yeasty goodness to the delicious smells wafting out of the kitchen.
After my parents moved to a retirement community, the traditional Thanksgiving dinner turned into them hosting us at the communal dining room. It was pretty upscale, with waiters and an amazing buffet table and even an ice sculpture. They paid for our meals ahead of time, and reserved a table big enough to seat all who could make it on the big day. Although she’d given up cooking, my mother still wanted to host Thanksgiving. I think she just really enjoyed seeing all of us gathered around the table.
A few years after she retired, Mom got sick and ended up in the hospital that fall. After some ups and downs, she had finally gotten well enough to move to a rehab unit. She wouldn’t be strong enough to get home by Thanksgiving. Or so everyone thought.
I’d been down there taking care of her, working my job remotely while I talked to doctors and therapists and kept track of the myriad details involved in the care of an elderly parent. I’d gotten her settled into the rehab unit, made sure she was comfortable, and then drove the eight hours back to Santa Cruz on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, sliding home ahead of the holiday traffic. Or so I thought.
On Wednesday morning while I was walking on the beach, Mom called me in tears. “I don’t want to be here. I want to be home for Thanksgiving. Come get me, please. I want to spend Thanksgiving with my family.”
There was no arguing with that. I threw some clothes in a bag, grabbed my laptop, wallet and keys, gassed up the car, and drove 500 miles in day-before-Thanksgiving traffic back to the rehab hospital. Mom was painfully thin and frail, but she was determined to go home. I got her into the car and then she helped me pick the best back roads to avoid the holiday traffic. (It helped that she had worked in Riverside for years and knew a dozen ways to get home; I think we used most of them that night.) I got her up to their fourth-floor apartment and made sure she was settled in bed before I left to check into my hotel room down the street and collapse from exhaustion.
The next day, my mother had the Thanksgiving dinner she had wanted so much. She had washed her hair, put on her makeup, and wore her favorite soft pink blazer and black pants. I still remember how her face glowed, sitting at that table with family around her. It was a very good day.
I didn’t know it then, but that was her last Thanksgiving. I wish I’d remembered to take a picture.
Be present in all things and thankful for all things.
Maya Angelou
Ah, Mark, I feel that. I am grateful for the conversations I did have, like the last one with my grandfather, when I didn’t know it would be the last one. But the missed ones, those are hard to think about. Hope you survived the holiday weekend OK.
Oh Annie, this is a beautiful Thanksgiving story. Thank you. Roxanne
Yup. Plenty of missed pictures, conversations, and, unfortunately, forgotten memories to go around.
Annie, Thanks for sharing. It brings back memories of our holiday meals. The getting up early , the cooking all day. We usually got a treat of home-made cinnamon roles for breakfast on holidays. My job. When the meal was over Dad ran all of us out of the kitchen and did all the dishes….
Happy Thanksgiving!
What sweet memories your story conjured up for me! Like you, my parents are also gone but the family traditions and recipes remain. There were 8 children in my family and our Aunts and Uncles would come from far and near to spend the day with us. Card tables and picnic tables were moved into the living room and chairs were rented to seat at least 20. My Mom never went to bed on Thanksgiving eve, instead she would be up baking pies, washing floors, and ironing the many table cloths. I am sorry to admit I never appreciated all her hard work until I was an adult hosting holiday dinners. The smell of turkey roasting still makes me feel like a young girl again, anticipating a day filled with wonderful conversation, family, and laughter. Thank you for sharing, Annie, and I wish you a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving day!
Thanks so much for sharing. As a daughter, you showed your love and compassion in heading back home for Thanksgiving. And you’ll never have to look back at this with regret, just love for making memories of the last Thanksgiving with your mom. Hugs!
What a warm and loving memory. You forgot to mention the one four leaf clover roll she hid in the bread basket. The kids always hoped they’d be the ones to find it. Happy Thanksgiving, Annie. Love you. Barb
Oh Annie, I know all the driving was worth it. Then and now. My Thanksgiving memories are of my Grandmother’s house. How it smelled, the sound of the swinging door between the kitchen and the dining room, sitting around after dinner on chairs and on the floor, half asleep with football on the tv but just as background noise as 3 families of kids chatted. At my house, my parents usually come stay with us and my mom makes all the pies, cranberry jello, homemade bread and breakfast rolls. Jesse usually does the bird, stuffing and gravy. I do all the sides. This year, my parents are staying home, Jesse is in a sling from shoulder surgery and I am the cook. I told my kids it was time they learned these traditions, so they will be helping me. They are adults, so this is a good way to pass the torch to them. This is my favorite holiday and I’m determined to love it this year even if it’s different.
Wonderful memory Annie, think how sad you would be if you had not taken the time to bring your Mom to that thanksgiving dinner. It is these memories that we need to remember these days.
In my family the traditional turkey dinner that we all enjoyed for years in time turned into a standing rib roast dinner. It was after I married and my mother was still cooking thanksgiving Christmas and Easter dinner that we all agreed that our favorite holiday meal was my mother’s famous standing rib roast with crisp potatoes, glazed onions, gravy, and sometime popovers. Until Mak died, I made that dinner for holidays and when family came to visit as a special treat. I also taught both of my sons how to pick out a good standing rib roast, how to roast it, make the gravy (and the secret ingredient in the gravyI) and cook glazed oinions – the popovers got dropped along the way. Both of my sons have cooked this for holiday meals, and my younger son in Tokyo and then in Hawaii where they usually go for Christmas. I am not sure what my younger son is doing for Christmas this year – probably they will be in Tokyo, older son is cooking part of the Thanksgiving dinner with his in-laws and children this year the feature will be Turkey but there will also be a rib roast. I will not be there – they are all in Truckee/Incline Village area and I am in NH at the old folks home. These are memories to cherish.
Thank you, Judy. Food does make and call up such deep memories, doesn’t it?
That was a beautiful tribute to your dear mother. Tears in Ottawa ❤️