Thanksgiving | BulgingButtons

October 26, 2014
by BulgingButtons 6 Comments

Why I Decorate For Holidays

Have you been inside a store lately? Someone thinks it’s Christmas already. It’s not. It’s still October. I’m not ready for Christmas. Or Thanksgiving. Or, frankly, even Halloween. In fact, I went out looking for some cool yard decorations for Halloween yesterday, but apparently you’re supposed to do that further in advance of the holiday than one week. Who knew? I did pick up a few small Thanksgiving decorations, on clearance, no less.

I’m slowly trying to rebuild my Halloween and Thanksgiving decoration stock, as I foolishly allowed most of it to be given away by my ex. It wasn’t his fault. I moved out of the house and left behind lots of things to donate. Somehow the box that contained some really wonderful decorations (including some handmade items and some treasures that my son made in his early years) ended up in that group. I’ve been mourning its loss for three years now.

The stacking jack-o-latern boxes, the ceramic haunted house candle holder, the cross-stitched ghosties, the tole painted pumpkins, the elegant ceramic pumpkins that used to grace my Thanksgiving table… all gone. So are the mini-pumpkin lights and the larger jack-o-lanterns stake lights for the yard. It still makes me sad to think about it.

As we speak, my house has a hand-made fabric wreath on the front door and a small wooden sign with a jack-o-lantern. There is a doormat in orange with a jack-o-lantern face on it, and a plug in jack-o-lantern that isn’t plugged in, because we need an extension cord. How is anyone going to know that we’re a house to trick-or-treat at? I know, I know… turn on the porch light and they will come. But it’s our first year in our new neighborhood, and I want to make a good impression. There should be some sign on Halloween on the premises!

When I was a kid we had a large plastic jack-o-lantern. We would place a small lamp inside of it and put it in the front window. It looked awesome! Then we would carve a pumpkin or two and stick those out on the porch, with candles in them, of course. I loved how it looked. It was the only time our house was ever really decorated for a holiday, at least from the outside.

My parents were immigrants, and my family is Jewish. We never did Christmas lights. In fact, it made my mom a little uncomfortable when my dad would bring home a wreath for the front door, which he did a couple of times during my growing up years. Our house basically always looked the same, inside and out.

Back in those days people didn’t go quite as crazy with the decorations as they do now, of course, but there were lots of Christmas lights in our neighborhood. They looked especially beautiful in the snow. I loved visiting my friends during the holiday season and seeing their Christmas trees and other decorations. I was always fascinated and enchanted by all the things that people would do to make their homes different and special during holidays, whether it was embroidered hand towels or special placemats or garland along a bannister. I always wished that we could do that at our house, but it was never going to happen.

We did have out our menorahs at Chanukah time, and one year my dad built a huge gingerbread house. We also dragged home a small evergreen and put it in a bucket in basement one year, much to my mother’s horror. Then there was the year that my dad and I built a “tree” out of dowels. I’m not sure if that was cool and creative or just plain pathetic. Anyway, our holiday decor was extremely limited.

I vowed that when I had a home of my own I would decorate it for the holidays, and I did. I still do. I don’t fill it to the gills with junk, I try to use pieces that make me happy individually, and that collectively create a festive feeling. That’s why replacing items is so difficult. The missing items were collected over years, and each had its own story. You can’t just load up at Target and call it done. Well, I can’t.

So now I’m back to clearing out clutter so I can enjoy my holiday decorations, such as they are, and I’m planning a trip to the hardware store for that extension cord. Who knows what I might pick up along the way? Maybe something spooky.

November 28, 2013
by BulgingButtons 19 Comments

Thanksgiving Memories

I’m seven years old. Cousin Frankie is visiting from South Africa. He’s my mother’s cousin and he’s over six feet tall. I come from a family of rather short people (not me, I’m adopted) and in this crowd he’s a giant. He lifts me to his shoulders. I am queen of the world. He gives me a whisker rub. He leaves me with a gold bracelet with my name engraved on it. I love cousin Frankie.

I don’t know exactly what year it is, but it’s the early 1970’s. I am wearing a long lavender dress. Long dresses are in fashion. We eat Thanksgiving dinner in a lovely large room at a country club. I will, many years later, hold my wedding reception in this same room at this same country club. I will wear a long dress that day too, but it will be white.

For many years in a row there is Thanksgiving dinner at my mother’s dining room table. She carves the turkey in the kitchen with the electric knife. It sounds as though there is a horror movie being filmed. We don’t dare enter. My grandmother brings the dressing, an old German recipe. It is delicious and like nothing else I have ever eaten. One year, in my early adulthood, she asks me what I would like for Hanukkah. I tell her I would like that recipe. She writes it for me in her spiky German inspired script. I treasure it, but cannot reproduce it.

I am a college student, on a study abroad semester in Great Britain. I miss my family and I miss the sound of English without a British accent and I miss salsa. I buy a plane ticket home for Thanksgiving. My father is furious at the idea but gives me the biggest hug of anyone at the airport. It was worth the money for that memory. I returned after a week much happier and much better adjusted. It was worth the money for the peace of mind.

We’ve recently moved away from family, the boyfriend (future ex-husband) and me. His brother and a friend live with us. Their grandfather and his crazy wife are in town. The four of us young people manage to cook our first Thanksgiving meal, and our elderly guests enjoy it greatly, as do we. The green bean casserole turns out too peppery, but other than that it is perfect, and Leon Lett doesn’t score his touchdown. I love that.

My son is small and his uncle is in town (father’s brother) as is his aunt (father’s step-sister). We hold Thanksgiving at our house (as has become tradition) and decide to do it on the back patio. It is a gorgeous warm day and we have a wonderful holiday.

I am in the midst of my divorce. We want to keep things as normal as possible for our 12 year old so I cook Thanksgiving dinner as always. I invite my ex-in-laws (out-laws?) to my home as I have for years. I also invite my ex-husband. I do not invite his girlfriend. We wait for him. We keep waiting for him. He finally calls. He has totaled his car on the way to my house. Nobody is hurt. His father picks him up. We carry on as if nothing has happened, because this is what we do.

I am in a new relationship. He is so different from any man I have ever known except one. He is like my father in many important ways. He wants to fry a turkey. This is completely unlike my father who had no interest in preparing food (although he did enjoy eating it, very much). We go on a quest to find the exact turkey fryer he wants. We end up with one that he thinks will do. It is just the two of us for Thanksgiving that year. His fried turkey is delicious. We have a new tradition. Fried for Thanksgiving, roasted for Christmas.

Life keeps changing. We change with it. Looking forward to many more Thanksgivings.

November 27, 2013
by BulgingButtons 36 Comments

Thanksgivukkah

I hate the name. It cheapens both Hanukkah and Thanksgiving, but there it is. The year that Hanukkah came early and Thanksgiving came late and worlds collided. I’m not really sure it’s that much of a collision, though. The traditional Thanksgiving, as I understand it, is a feast of gratitude for survival. It’s a celebration of life and living, and its hallmarks are food, family, and friends. Maybe this is too Charlie Brown, or too simplistic, but that’s how it is in my world.

To me, and this is my blog, so it’s my interpretation we’re going with here, it’s about getting up, watching the parade, cooking delicious food, eating early, drinking plenty of adult beverages, maybe watching football and maybe not, maybe going for a walk and maybe not, eating dessert later because right after the meal there’s just no room for it, and generally ending the evening on a good note with random family members and friends helping out in the kitchen.

Hanukkah isn’t a whole lot different, except that it’s more of a season and less of an event. Again, this is my interpretation. For a long time I was married to a man who was not Jewish. We did the whole Christmas thing, but we also included some Hanukkah in there. He’s out of the picture (more or less), but our son is not. There is also my sweetheart in the mix now, a man who loves Christmas, but was once married to a Jewish woman and now has me. He goes with the flow. The Hanukkah flow is generally something like this: one night (usually the first, but it depends on schedules) we have a traditional potato latke dinner, then light the candles and exchange some small gifts. Small. Like a magazine. A deck of cards. A flash drive. The other nights we usually light the candles (provided we get home at an early enough hour and don’t forget) and go about our business. One night we usually go to Mom’s house for the whole big dinner thing. That’s it. I love the candles. I love the latkes. I love the little gifts, but frankly they’re mostly for my son, and now that he’s older it’s hard to find 8 small things. I used to do dollar store stuff, but there’s no sense in buying stuff just to buy it.

The melding of these two holidays isn’t a bad thing at all. We eat, drink, and make merry in a spirit of gratitude surrounded by our families and friends. Who can argue with that, even if it does play havoc on the internal calendar? So I’m off to dust off the menorahs, line up the turkey baster, and pop the latkes in the oven. Oh, and I need to bake the cornbread for the stuffing and find the Hanukkah gift wrap. No problem. I’ve got this covered. Happy Holiday to you, whatever you may be celebrating.