Pgh Lesbian Correspondents

Sometimes we celebrated Thanksgiving at home – just me, little brother and my parents. My Mum is not a great cook, but she pulled this meal off pretty well. Sometimes, we went to my aunt’s house a few miles away. That was more “special” but also strange because there were so many people and different conversations. I remember wandering from room to room – we were the only kids for years. I would try to sneak off and read, but inevitably some relative would admonish me and drag me into an adult conversation.

But the one thing that was always good was the Kerr traditional Thanksgiving meal – turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing AND dressing (normal stuffing, nothing fancy), turkey gravy, etc.

Over the years, I’ve had lots of unusual holiday meals – a San Antonio turkey, an authentic Cajun deep fried turkey, a goose, and even a poor grad student Denny’s meal. But I always miss the traditional.  And once I was an adult with a job and an income, I decided that I would have my favorite meal of the year for MY holiday.

When my partner and I first partnered, we spent a few years divvying up the holidays between her family a few hours north of Pgh and my family here. We both had living grandparents in their 90’s so it seemed the right thing to do – for us to make it work, to drive, to eat two meals, to spend half the holiday either on the highway or apart. As they are wont to do, 90something grandparents pass away and the holiday dynamic shifted with the birth of a niece and a nephew. Suddenly we were driving in different directions, but still driving and accommodating and occasionally managing to get all of the in-laws into one house.

But you know something – when you are the childfree couple in the family, no one ever asks if you have a stuffing preference or what type of pie they should serve. There’s no opportunity to negotiate because you are simply the “flexible ones.” Often, you bring the bread. We usually sent a centerpiece. Woo hoo. We mostly didn’t even get leftovers.

One year, I said ENOUGH! Enough, I said. I have Thanksgiving traditions in my heart that I want to experience with my partner who is my family.  So we decided that we would go out for dinner after spending the noontime meal with someone else’s family.

Wow, Thanksgiving dinners are expensive or buffet. But when we are crammed in some Atria’s somewhere in the evening hours eating our much too large portions of what I deem a good Thanksgiving menu, it’s very sweet. It’s our family and I don’t want to give that up. Not the sweetness I feel and not control of the menu either. 🙂

I appreciate that people invite us to their homes, but I still need my fix. Even my price fixe! See what I did there?

I truly am grateful that some establishments are open on Thanksgiving for us and for so many others who simply don’t share the typical turkey-extended family-football holiday tradition. But that’s another post for another day.

It is perfectly lovely for you to invite your friends to spend the holiday with you, but might I suggest that you ask them if there’s a tradition they’d like to incorporate. If you asked me, I’d ask about your menu and then offer to bring something specific from mine. THAT’s including people in your tradition rather than simply being charitable. It makes a tremendous difference in dignity and respect to do that.

This year we are going to see some friends at noon for an undefined somewhat Buddhist Thanksgiving (I am so unsure what this means) and then hopefully going to dinner together for our family time. A few people have invited us to their homes so it might be fun to travel around.

Having fun and having choices is simply a privilege I’ve never had before in my previous 42 Thanksgivings.