thanksgiving memories

If I were in America, I'd be getting ready for Thanksgiving now - or actually we'd possibly have already left, in my childhood, for Washington, DC, where we spent most Thanksgivings with my dad's family. His uncle practiced law in DC throughout my childhood, and his aunt worked for the council of governors, and I looked forward anxiously to the memorials, the National Zoo, and the museums all year long, plus the stuffed-to-bursting dining room with family, friends, and Somalian refugees (my great-aunt and uncle were in Somalia before the last regime change when they were in the peace corps). A couple of days a year would be spent playing board games with family, and a couple at the Mall.

Wandering in the sculpture garden eating street vendor pretzels; lagging behind with my mom in the art museum while everyone else rushed through; visiting all my old friends in the Natural History Museum, especially the spiral staircase with the huge hanging tribal art in the middle, and looking for new exhibits I didn't remember; running in the rain through the Korean War Memorial, side-by-side with life-size bronze soldiers creeping through the undergrowth; the huge animated clock at the National Zoo, where the tiny parade of animals troops around the edges when it chimes the hour; seeing snow, which used to be most likely to happen in DC even though we spent about half our Christmases in Kansas City; getting in line behind the sculptural citizens in line for foodstamps in the FDR Memorial (though not until I was in high school: that one's newer).

In later years, DC became harder to manage and the dad's-family-reunions stayed at Thanksgiving but moved to my parents' house in Alabama, which meant my grandfather, estranged from his former brother-in-law some twenty years, was able to attend (they've since reconciled however), and it wasn't so far to travel for most everybody.

Now that my dad is in a wheelchair, travel is difficult enough even were the price of gas on that 15-hour drive to DC not an issue, and they're the default hosts for Thanksgiving. I haven't seen any extended family except my grandfather since 2004. I'd give a lot to attend a family reunion, for either side. I've been holding Channukah yearly since I moved here, trying to comfort myself, I suppose, with childhood rituals and warm memories. I'm lucky that my friends have an interest in participating in my cultural traditions, and I tried Passover last year too. This Thursday will be my first Thanksgiving, though. There's a lack of pumpkins for pumpkin bread, but at least I'll be happy to get rid of the turkey.

ufo-like

icicles on outdoor area lighting during blizzard last night

The light isn't actually green, usually. I'm not sure what made it turn out like that.

The Crazy Bed is a small cat bed shaped like a cookie tin (you can see it in numerous cat pictures like this one) and it's been lined for a year or so with a piece of discarded knitting (a sweater vest of chunky three-ply beige-taupe yarn) because the Crazy loves this yarn. It's like catnip to her, and she always wants to snuggle it when she sees it, so we sort of used the unfinished vest as a little blanket for her... until Wax took it out and unravelled it, intending to start over and make me a vest that fit better. So I took a skein of the same yarn and crocheted a fitted liner for the bed like a giant bucket hat, with a wide edge that flips out and over the top. The Crazy is now happily snuggled in her refurbished perch under her baby blanket. And I did the entire thing yesterday and this morning, pretty much. We had six hours of tv or so to catch up on, I think. In conclusion: my crocheting is getting fast. I did it for a few hours last night while reading, for the most part without looking at my hands. Muscle memory: it's pretty grate akshully.