when did that happen?!
November 24th, 2006 by Liss
We did Thanksgiving dinner yesterday at our house. It was low-key - just the three of us plus J’s parents and sister - but even a low-key Thanksgiving dinner is still a big meal to pull off well. It’s not a difficult meal to prepare by any wild stretch, but there’s always that sense of importance to it, like there might be some dire consequences if it doesn’t go well.
When I was growing up, I used to think that the big holiday meals - Thanksgiving especially - came together through some mysterious process that may or may not have involved arcane rituals and speaking in tongues. (Probably just a bit of under-the-breath cursing, I’ve since discovered.) Once I was out on my own, I found that I could prepare those meals myself, but they were somehow never the same. The food was all there - the turkey, the stuffing, the sweet potatoes and pumpkin pie - but there was something missing, and I never quite knew what it was.
This year I think I figured out what was missing: confidence. The feeling that I’m in charge of the meal, and I can do it my way without apology to anyone who isn’t in charge of the kitchen. I decided how the table would be set (with the good silver, passed down from my grandmother) and I was in charge of making sure that everything ended up hot at the same time. I was the one shooing my “helpful” husband out of the way and telling him to just go pour some wine or something. It was my house, my kitchen, my dinner, and for the first time I really didn’t care whether someone would rather have mashed potatoes or candied yams instead of what they were getting.
I finally figured out that I really am the grown-up now. I’m not an imposter just filling the stage until the star appears - it’s my stage to fill. Best of all…this year, finally, I’m the mom.