The Rituals are Always the Same

The Rituals are Always the Same

 

Almost two weeks go by before I look to my blog again. I have been far too caught up in all the exams that are crammed in before a break. Predictably, I bomb calculus. And while I should be upset by it, I’ve stopped caring. The class is little more than a social hour for me by now. I go to be with my friends, there is no way I’ll be able to learn anything anyway, why waste the effort.

            The Thanksgiving holiday brings a welcome break to the hectic life of a college student. There is nowhere I have to be, no one I have to see, and nothing I have to do. I just get to relax, even if it is only for three days. The second my final class lets out on Wednesday I’m up in my room throwing things in a suitcase. A few minutes later I’m in the passenger seat of my father’s car right where I belong.

            This will be a weekend for family, and I’m lucky enough to be with the portion of mine I actually enjoy being around. I couldn’t imagine being forced to sit through a meal with my mother. Even the thought of being with her on the holidays stresses me out. I still love her, even after everything that happened, but I would never be able to fully get over the pain that she caused when she walked out on us, leaving me as a sort of stand in mother for my then six year old brother.

            But this holiday wouldn’t be with here, it was to be with my father, a man I always admired. After two years of not talking to him he opened his arms to me during my senior year like none of it mattered. And while he didn’t know about my depression either, I knew he cared about me and would always support me.

            The sight of my father’s house made me jittery. I was happy to get to see this small chunk of my family. My grandparents had always been amazing and my uncle and aunt from Pennsylvania had made the trip up to finally get to be a part of it. It was exciting and I knew there would be an adventure over dinner, considering last time my uncle came up the two of us managed to start a food fight that ended when my sister and father were covered in whip cream and fruit salad.

            Everything went smoothly, and for once in a few months I wasn’t depressed. I wasn’t happy, but that was okay. I was used to not being happy, and anything was better than the void, empty feeling of depression. Immediately after the holiday I got to thinking about everything that I had been taught when I was young. I dwelled on the old traditions and mixed them in with all the new ones I was now facing. The holidays and their meaning were changing for me, and in a way, I welcomed the new with open arms.

 

Thoughts on Thanksgiving

November 23, 2012

 

This year for Thanksgiving I had the privilege of taking my boyfriend to my family dinner. He was invited by my grandmother who insisted he be there, so without even thinking about it he came. It's one of those things, if Grandma says be here you get your a*s there, no questions asked. That's just the way it works with grandmothers. I arrived on Tuesday, whisked away from my dorm room by my father to sleep on an air mattress in my sister's room. 

I spent all day Wednesday baking pies and cakes from recipes that have been in the family for years and making a stuffing that existed in my grandmother's childhood. I got to taste everything both before and after it was cooked. We danced in the kitchen just like when I was little and it got me thinking of how simple things used to be. Back before being sucked through two divorces and countless lost friends. Life was easy, all that mattered was cooking with Grandma and dancing in her kitchen to the Beach Boys. I was the official taster back then, all of us children were because who better to try the food then the pickiest eaters in the house.

I learned to make a pie crust this weekend. She taught me all the tricks to make it flakey and how to make it easier to transfer it into the pie tin. My pie crust looked good, decent, but Grandma's was pretty. Her pinched edges were lovely, mine were unevenly spaced and mixed up. But she was still proud of me even though it didn't look like hers. It's been a while since someone has been that genuinely proud of me for something that wasn't related to school or my writing. I can do school, I can do writing, but everything else eludes me. I'm not the best painter, and I can't really give advice. But apparently my pie crust is worth of the praise of a woman I have always looked up to. It's worthy of the woman that dances with me in the kitchen to songs older than I am while making a mess of flour and egg all over the floor. 

Then at dinner the next day everyone seemed just as proud of the crust I'd made by hand. My own pride welled up and I started to realize something that never occurred to me before. The crust wasn't pretty, but it tasted just like the one Grandma had made. And sure I made a mess in the process, but the conclusion was just as grand as it would have been had the kitchen been spotless when I was finished. That pie crust seemed to make a lot of sense to me all of a sudden. My life may be messy, filled with mistakes, and nothing like the life anyone else in my family leads. And it may turn out not nearly as pretty, but it will still be worth praise and my own pride because I worked for it. I made this life what it is. Through my own hard work, my own messes, and my own special tricks I made my pie crust and filled it to the brim with whatever fruit was handy. I put forth the effort and allowed my life to be shaped by my own hands. I am still filling it with fruit, a process that will take much longer than filling my pie crust was, but I will still do it. And while some of the fruit may be rotten, the sweet flavor of the rest will make it just as good as anyone else