Thanksgiving in the Land of Deseret

I've been up for about an hour now. Both dogs are still curled into themselves, asleep. Neither budged when I got out of bed, thinking to take them outside. I'm back in bed, thinking about the order of what should be cooked first, the dishes that will be best for display and will travel best, if I'll wear jeans or a skirt. I'm mentally going down my list - I'll make my checklist one I'm out of bed for the day. Since Thanksgiving isn't at my house this year, I have the luxury of being a guest rather than the host. Instead of mad cleaning the entire house, cleaning my set of vintage silver and mix - matched white china collection, or preparing the entire feast, I'll prepare my three assigned dishes: honey glazed ham, chocolate chili spice cake, and green salad, then get everybody in the car and head south.

I'd love to know the traditional dishes my neighbors and fellow Utahans will be serving today, how they differ from family to family, and what, if any experimental dishes will be on the menu. One new dish we'll be having is a Finnish halibut potato mash. I'm making chocolate chili spice cake instead of regular spice cake because my father objected, mainly because I made it Sunday and he's been eating it all week and he wants something else.

I am a closet sentimentalist, so Thanksgiving always has me on the verge of making cliched toasts about family and love and gratitude. You'll be relieved to know, I've spared friends and family, what could potentially be long winded, platitude filled, never-ending speeches, because I am unusually prone to being sneak attacked by emotion. I cry easily. I can't help it.

I come from a very large family: mother and father; two brothers, four sisters, and me; twenty-eight nieces and nephews, and fifteen great- nieces & nephews. One branch of the family is tangled right now, but I'm hopeful that there will be positive resolution. The prodigal son sort, not The Godfather sort. Today I am grateful for all fifty- two. And I'm grateful for my own tiny clan of twelve. All we have is each other. Thanksgiving is a holiday that reminds me of Rumi's "Guest House" in which being human is a guest house and each emotion is a guest. On this holiday family gathers together, and each member is an aspect or reflection of ourselves, and we should be grateful to them, even if they clear our house, because, they may indeed be preparing us for some new delight.

I resolve to be grateful every day.