news-record.com

Thanksgiving is over, and we are headed into the Christmas holidays.

In the past, the day after Thanksgiving, I was overstuffed and tired — of cooking and washing dishes.

But it has been several years since I’ve cooked an entire Thanksgiving dinner. Now, because my children are gone, I eat with relatives or go to the home of a friend or neighbor.

Sometimes, we don’t even have Thanksgiving until the Saturday afterward because schedules are so hectic with trying to please all the relatives on Thanksgiving Day.

For several years in the late ’90s, my Uncle Shug Somers, Aunt Audrey Coe and sometimes my sister, Linda Smith, would eat at an area restaurant.

How nice that was — to go in and make a selection from a big variety of meats, vegetables and especially desserts and then get up and leave all the dirty dishes on the table!

But I have to admit it’s not quite Thanksgiving without an array of leftovers on which to snack for several days. I always thought the leftovers were better than the actual dinner.

From the time I married in 1963 until 1989, I don’t think I ever missed cooking Thanksgiving dinner.

I would plan my menu and do my shopping weeks in advance, perusing all kinds of recipe books and considering drastic changes — like ham and potato salad instead of turkey, dressing and creamed potatoes — before always reverting to the same menu.

My children, Stevie and Anna, liked to shop with me for the holiday. They would select the biggest turkey available! A small one, a turkey breast or a hen just wouldn’t do!

I still can see Stevie, at after-Thanksgiving lunch, gnawing on a turkey leg about as big as he was at the time.

And, of course, the children always had to break the wishbone; do children even do that anymore, I wonder?

The children also looked forward to helping me stuff the turkey and loved to scrape the bowls in which I mixed the pumpkin pie and whipped cream. (Never would I have dared serve frozen or canned dairy products on a holiday).

Many times, one or both stood in a chair to help roll out the pie crusts. Stevie always managed to gather the excess dough and hide it until he could think of some way to make a big mess with it.

Certain foods were traditions with us. In addition to the stuffed turkey and all the trimmings, the children and my former husband always liked spiced apples and peaches, a fruit salad with sour cream, fresh apple cake and yeast rolls.

The year after we moved to Arizona, we had Thanksgiving with my in-laws.

I already had bought a turkey and all the other groceries I needed, but I put them away. The turkey could be cooked on Saturday for the weekend, I decided.

Grandma Reva Fish outdid herself with her meal. She had all kinds of desserts, vegetables and salads. I took a pumpkin pie and yeast rolls. We all ate and ate and ate. After cleaning up the dishes and visiting for a while, we returned to our house.

And to an empty kitchen and refrigerator.

Stevie and his dad looked especially upset.

“What’s wrong,” I asked.

“We don’t have any leftovers,” my husband exclaimed.

“Mama, why did you let everybody eat all the pie?” Stevie asked.

Now, you can’t spend Thanksgiving Day loafing around all day, watching parades and ball games without leftovers, can you? At least my family didn’t think we could.

I pulled the turkey from the fridge and soon had the house smelling like it should on Thanksgiving Day.

Admittedly, dinner was a little late that night. And the sink was filled with a mountain of dirty dishes that a tired Mama tackled about midnight.

But, the leftovers were filling the refrigerator to overflowing.

Thank goodness the children are now grown with their own families and can do their own cooking and dish washing.

For me, it’s a luxury to eat my fill, push back my chair and head home to an afternoon of watching parades and reading without worrying about cooking or doing dishes!

That’s a luxury I never had until about 10 years ago!

Ann Fish is a Reidsville native but has lived in Eden since 1979. She is a retired newspaper editor and reporter. Contact her at annsomersfish@yahoo.com