As a kid, spending the holidays with my family felt like a pain worse than death.  Everyone fought with one another.  I felt my dad’s tension swell from the moment we all piled into the car for the long trip to Long Island.  My grandmother brought new meaning to “back seat driving” as she situated herself directly behind my mother and pretended to break each time another car came within 500 feet of us.  My brother squeezed in the middle and I sat behind my dad.  My brother kicked the seats.  My parents bickered.

Mom would make at least three different stops (aka shopping excursions) along the way.    Grandma became terribly impatient and would insist upon waiting in the car, regardless of the store.  Just to spite her, my mother would spend what felt like an eternity at every stop, torturing us with bargain hunting as we all waited for her to get a move on.

In the car, I became a captive audience.  Just like the villain in a bad horror movie after he’s trapped the hero with seemingly no hope for escape, my mother reveled in the opportunity to hold me in captive audience.  As soon as we hit the Belt Parkway, she began nagging away.  

“Why do you dress all in black?  It is not feminine.  Why don’t you cut your hair?   I don’t like those friends of yours, stop hanging around them.  How come you don’t help out around the house…”

My grandmother tried to come to my rescue.  “Why don’t you leave her alone,” she chided to no avail.

By the time we arrived at my aunt’s house, I bolted from the car and ran up to my cousin’s room, where we locked ourselves away until dinner time.  “She is so awful!” I would cry to Michele in exasperation.  

My father and uncle sat in the den watching football on a TV so loud we could hear it outside.  My mother, aunt, and grandmother all congregated in the kitchen while my brother and cousins entertained themselves, at least until they began to fight.

By the time we made it to the dinner table, my younger cousins were all fighting.  My grandmother began to vocalize her impatience.  “Hurry up, let’s eat,” she insisted.  My aunt ignored everything that didn’t involve food preparation.  My mother helped her.

Grandma always brought goodies.  No matter what the holiday was, grandma made mounds of potato knishes, stuffed mushrooms, and kreplach (Jewish dumplings).  Sometimes she would make deviled eggs (my cousins all loved them) and sometimes she brought cheese blintzes.  

We all eagerly anticipated grandma’s food, especially the potato knishes.  I would secretly steal some in the car on the way up.  Grandma gave me a sly look, “Shh, go ahead,” as she passed me a knish.  As the matriarch of our family, my grandmother rooted the bond that kept us all together. No matter how much we fought, annoyed each other or disagreed, grandma had some invisible string that kept us coming back.  

Six years ago, my grandmother passed away.  It happened three weeks before Thanksgiving.  That year, I resolved to host the entire family at my home for the holiday. We were all pained and grieving.  I prepared a formal, elegant six course meal that began with chocolate gold coins as place markers; a tablecloth that my mother hand embroidered as a child; my grandmother’s silver; mother’s serving dishes, and ended with at least five different dessert options.  Something within each of us healed that evening.  However, that meal would be the last meal my family would share in its entirety.  

Since then, I have hosted Thanksgiving many times.  My father has long since passed.  My mother and her sister usually spend it in Florida (New York is too cold for them in November) and most of my cousins do not talk to one another anymore.  This year, only my cousin Michele came for dinner.  My brother planned to come up, but he had a minor crisis to attend to that prevented him from joining us at the last moment.

I made a turkey.  When I went to the organic farm to order it, I asked for the smallest one they had.  Well, that turned out to be a 15lb turkey.  I will be eating turkey for quite some time.  





I also made mashed potatoes and gravy.  For the stuffing, I made a bacon, sausage, apple, and dried plum stuffing with homemade chicken stock and fresh herbs.  Michele made a delicious sweet potato casserole and fresh cranberry sauce.






For dessert, I thought my brother and cousin would take much of it home, so I made a pumpkin pie (that turned out to be two pies – one I will bring to a friend later) and homemade canolis.











Michele took a lot of food home.  The two of us had a lovely, low key day.  I have a ton of leftovers, and tomorrow morning, I am going back to the gym.  

It’s funny how what seemed so torturous as a child could be so tenderly missed as an adult.  After my grandmother’s passing, the bonds that held our family together, snapped.  We are fragmented now.  Each of us went on to live our own lives, only to reflect back on those times at holidays and odd moments now and again.