My 78th Thanksgiving Dinner

There is no way to produce symmetry if someone
keeps taking one beet and then another
off of the plate.

... the white meat on one plate ...

... gravy simmering on the stove ...

... the dark meat on another plate ...

A new addition to Thanksgiving dinner --
a cake ladle that looks like a high heel ...
Thank you Salmon Arm Churches Thrift Store.

David said that the plate was just fine to eat off of,
until the food was gone and a person was left looking
at the eyeball of a woman.

Why don't I have a Halloween decoration like this,
I asked.
Because you didn't buy the book at Costco
that tells about the human hand, said Wyona.

This is a partial image from a painting that hangs
on the wall and which represents thanksgiving
to me -- a prairie thanksgiving of the wheat harvest.

This is David's new favourite vegetable.
He learned about it on his trip to Spain this year.

... a salad loaded with vegetables ...

Wyona called me with an invitation to come down and eat Thanksgiving Dinner with them.

There was a turkey cooking at Glen’s house, and six people had the table decked, really decked for Thanksgiving.

Moiya had 11 people at her house and they had cooked their turkey the day before.

She was generous with the left-overs and that is what we ate when we were at the Tsutwecw Provincial Park (pronounced “choo-chwek”) enjoying the Salute to the Sockeye.

Wyona and Greg were doing their turkey on Sunday.

Alone.

It was a Thanksgiving dinner to equal, if not surpass any other Thanksgiving dinner in the world.

I think all Thanksgiving dinners are perfect.

At our cabin, two days before we had a dinner over which Miranda and I gave thanks.

Michael had asked for sweet potatoes.

 I can’t remember what the second item was, but the third was deer sausage.

Nothing could be more authentic than that.

Richard roasts the sausages and then cuts them in about 1 ½ inch rounds.

Michael thinks he has a feast, as is, the succulent meat and the juice glistening on the casing.

Alice needs mustard and she carefully places it on top of the round and then eats the sausage as an hors d’oeurve, a two bite moment for her.

Wyona had worked on her more traditional dinner for two days.

Who doesn’t if it the work starts out by making two cheese-cakes, outstanding for they were filled with apples grown within a few yards of her house, and topped with local peaches from the summer. 

By the time I arrived at the house the first set of dishes was done – the turkey roaster already clean and the gravy sitting on the stove, a whisk laying in the pot and light gleaming from its surface.

The beets were from Janet, her neighbour next door.

The asymmetrical arrangement of them was due to the fact that whenever Wyona passed by the beets, she took one more.

 “I just love beets”, she said.

“I don’t know why, but they are so delicious to me, I can’t stop eating them.”

 I could tell from the number of rounds already missing from the plate.

Wyona invited Bonnie, David and Joaquim to join us for dinner.

 They arrived, David with two gift baskets of apples in his hands.

One for me and one from Wyona.

They had come from his own tree.

 Every mouthful was delicious.

 Someone asked me why I hadn’ taken any turkey dressing, after looking at my plate.

 The answer is, I ate it first, every delectable morsel until it looked as though there had been nothing on my plate in that area.

 don’t know if I mentioned that the dessert was pear cheese cake topped with a peach compote – the peaches from the summer.

 As well, there was an extra-ordinary amount of whipping cream to add to the top, or to put on the side of the plate as a decoration.

 There are many sets of dishes to be washed during a thanksgiving dinner.

That first set when the preparation is being done.

That second set, just as the vegetables are coming out of the pots and going into serving dishes.

Then the third set of dishes is done when the meal is finished.

Having done all of these, Wyona pulled out the bridge cards.

Bonnie and Wyona tried to beat Greg and me. I don’t remember the score – only that in one hand Greg bid 6 spades and nailed it.

Now that is something to be thankful for. As we played, Joachim and David played cribbage at the other end of the table.

This was Joachim’s first time with the game and when it was over I heard him say, “Now that I know all of the rules David, let me have another go at it.”

And now, just one more turkey to be cooked.

The one that is at my house.

Thanksgiving Event number 4 coming up.

Gift baskets.  One for Wyona.  One for Arta.

... thanks for the invitation to come ...
... so glad to be here ...

My family mostly cooked chickens when I was growing up.

... melted marshmallows on sweet potates ...
a tradition in some house and not in others

... turkey dressing
the recipe is never the same from one
Thanksgiving to the next ...

cheesecake on a yellow sunflower platter