“Onions, melted butter and celery” a wide grin
spreading across my still sleepy face as I tugged at the thick comforter and
wiggled out from under the covers, eyes squinting in the morning sun as I dug
my toes into the thick bedroom carpet. Whenever I recall my mother’s somewhat
elusive but captivating smile, I will forever think of onions, melted butter
and celery because when I woke smelling those three things, it meant only two
things, it was Thanksgiving and my mother was going to be genuinely happy. That
was her holiday, the only one that didn’t point out how much we didn’t have or
what she couldn’t afford to give us. A day devoted to two things she loved,
cooking for her family and eating.
I woke Thanksgiving morning thinking of her, or
thinking of onions, melted butter and celery and no longer that sleepy faced 8
year old wiggling out from under the sheets on the bed that she and I shared,
it still filled my heart and in truth, brought a quick flood of tears to my
eyes. Just as quickly as that tiny storm of missing took hold of me it left and
I was there alone in my bed, my gown up bed that I have shared with my husband
for 45 years, (okay, maybe a few less but some days….feels like at least that
long) alive and thriving in this life I could never have even begun to imagine.
A mother, a wife, a wine specialist, a friend, a sometimes writer and the thing
that might have made her most proud, a pretty damn good cook who may have just
found a bit of her passion for food and cooking over a pile of diced aromatics,
a pan of milky and sweet smelling liquid, the steadying shreds and soothing
feeling of thick carpet between my toes while my tummy bounced about at the
very idea of an entire day of genuine smiles, mouthwatering aromas and plunging
my three tined fork into that perfectly fluffy pile of boiled and beaten
potatoes.
Thanksgiving. A day of reflection, indulgence, reverie,
patience and deep breaths. Long, slow cooking, hours of enticement and
interaction, laughter and annoyance. A day once dedicated to bounty and thanks
but now, sadly, simmered down to the obligatory family dinner and rushing out
to trample people just hours after professing your gratitude for the things you
have. Weird holiday that, but one that thankfully fills me with the sweetest of
memories. The shuffling into the kitchen in the “big ugly house” helping my
mother set the thick and icy bird into the sink as she cursed, (um, ever wonder
where I got my potty mouth?) and hissed that the “fucking thing won’t be thawed
in time” knowing that the second she drifted off I would be pushing one of the
tall backed chairs from the dining room into the kitchen, lifting and huffing,
making sure not to have the sturdy legs scratch or scrape the floor too loudly,
my toes digging into the sides of the decorative and puffy fabric as I balanced
myself reaching for the knobs on the faucet as I enticed our familial turkey
into readiness for the oven with a slow stream of just-warm water. Hours, I
would stand there for hours, slow trickle of water my soundtrack, fingers
shriveled and forearms weary as I flipped the giant bird this way and that,
trying to ensure that the second she shuffled to the sink in the morning, heavy
flannel nightgown brushing against her dry skin…(another aromatic memory), pudgy
fingers poking, judging and deeming the bird suitable for stuffing and that
smile…it would start there and get wider with each one of her little kitchen
victories. In her kitchen, when she truly felt like it was hers, that woman was
my hero and to this day I am not only in awe of what she was able to do, with
so little, she was and will forever be my hero, one that smelled of chopped onions,
celery and melted butter when she smiled.
Of course she was with me the second I woke
Thanksgiving morning, which is as it should be right? We reflect and remember
on a day dedicated to being grateful and revolving around food, how could I not
think of my buttery smelling, nightgown wearing grinner? Had to, she was there
but it was the smell of my own sheets, the coffee that had brewed and was
beckoning, and my jammies redolent with my aromatics that flipped those covers
off my sleepy frame and drew me to my kitchen. The pans cold, my chosen red color,
no bird resting in the sink, the eyebrow over my left eye raised as I pulled
the butcher paper wrapped bacon and Styrofoam housed eggs from the fridge, the
smells from my Thanksgiving kitchen as my son slept in his room for the first
time, on that day, in four years. I knew how he would feel waking up, the way
his toes would sink into the carpet as the wisps of bacon and toasted bread
pulled him from his slumber, beckoned him to the woman in the kitchen in
jammies, holding a plate of proudly prepared food, bearing a grin that can only
come with the pride that is being his mother….of what I was able to make to satiate
him. Never understood my mother’s Thanksgiving grin until she was long gone,
there are very few things that I regret but not telling her how magnificent,
(and I just typed mag-nis-a-fent which was how I said that as a kid, always
made her laugh and just now, made me tear up a little….fuck I miss her) her Thanksgiving was. How she made me ache to
be like her, do what she did, create and inspire, bring joy and absolute peace
with something as simple as onions, melted butter, celery and a genuine smile…
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