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November 22, 2007
My First Los Angeles Thanksgiving
No. Not today. Today is my... um... what... tenth Los Angeles Thanksgiving? Yes. That's it. Nine Thanksgivings "this time" I've been living out here (Yowza. My tenth anniversary in LA is next year? Eep!) and the one from "my first time" living in Los Angeles--you know, before the Northridge Quake. Before OJ. Before the area code called "323."
Okay, so once upon a time, I was a vegetarian. I'm not sure why. Oh, wait, I remember. I'd had my wisdom teeth extracted and I ended up not eating for the entire summer I turned 15. I got blissfully anorexic. Like 108 pounds. And I'm tall. So that was killer-cool. Eventually, I would have to eat again, though. (And how! Hah!) And when I did start eating again, I never added meat back in.
Well, not never. Obviously. I think I went about three years without eating meat. I ate seafood, since that didn't walk around or get milked or anything, but I was a pretty dang good vegetarian, I think. I wasn't militant. I wasn't doing it for "animal rights" or anything.
No one ever really noticed that I didn't eat turkey at Thanksgiving. I would eat dressing and gravy, so why should anyone expect that I would end up hiding that little wedge of white meat under my cranberry sauce? I guess I wasn't a great vegetarian after all. There's turkey broth in the gravy, right?
Oh well.
So, back to My First Los Angeles Thanksgiving.
This dinner took place in Calabassas in 1993. I was away from home for the first Thanksgiving of my young life. My boss, president of the musical artist management firm where I worked, fancied himself my LA-based father figure, and called my mother from the office to tell her I'd be having a traditional Thanksgiving dinner at his home.
Awesome. I couldn't wait. Mom was thrilled. Ended up mailing Jeff a thank you note, saying it meant the world to her that her baby was being taken care of so far away from home.
I asked if I could bring anything, as good southern girls do, and was told just to bring myself; his wife would have everything prepared. Truth be told, his wife was more of a supervisor in that kitchen; directing traffic made up of four non-English-speaking employees. I chose to hang out in the study with my boss, a record label exec, and Meat Loaf's business manager. I had more in common with them, somehow.
Dinner is served. Yay!
Oh... wait...
Why are there raisins and walnuts in my cranberry sauce? How is oyster stuffing considered a complementary dressing for turkey? And where are the mashed potatoes? Where is the candied marshmallow glaze across the sweet potatoes? Where is The Parade of Casseroles? And why are we drinking wine? I'm expecting iced tea so sweet that a spoon stands up in the glass.
Suddenly, I miss home.
Give me over-cooked green beans, five different forms of starch, and cranberry sauce with rings on it, fresh from the can. Then, I'll be able to pass out after Thanksgiving dinner like every other loyal American former vegetarian: properly stuffed, in front of the television, hoping to be woken up for pecan pie, pumpkin pie, and banana pudding with Nilla Wafers.
Tiramisu is for communists.
Posted by bonnie at November 22, 2007 3:39 AM
Comments
Hi everyone, it's Thanksgiving Day! I'm happy with my extra day off, and I am planning to doing something fun that'll probably involve a bike ride and seeing something new in Coralville I haven't seen yet.
You write something new at Thanksgiving?
Posted by: Kuczenski Giuditta at November 27, 2009 12:50 AM