(from 11/24/2016)
Daily Grist…”Can we not all come together on one day, especially the one day set aside in America for giving thanks for all the blessings that we enjoy. Can we not all come together, foregoing the titles that we call ourselves politically and personally, and call ourselves proud Americans! A title that the rest of the world aspires to be called. I care not what you call yourself, but my family and I are proud to be called Americans.” JD Rhynes
During my 78 years here on this Earth a lot of past Thanksgiving days stand out in my memory, some more than others. My mother gave birth to four children and I was the second born, but my older brother Lee died of leukemia in April of 1941, so the mantle of being a big brother fell on my shoulders to my younger brother and sister. By the time I was 10 years old I was well over 5 feet tall so I was assigned the duty of being my mother’s principal helper when it came to preparing meals for our extended family on the holidays. This was no small chore, especially for me because I was assigned the duty of being”the motor”for the homemade ice cream freezer I had to crank for hours on end. When I was growing up my family consisted of my mother and father, me my younger brother and sister, and my uncle Jack , aunt Violet and aunt Myrtle, my mother’s younger brother and two sisters. Their parents had died in the late 30s, and soon after we came to California in 1941 they came to live with us. By the time I was 10 years old they had all married and were starting families of their own, and they always spent Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners with us. My father’s two older sisters and their husbands were usually at our house for holiday dinners as well, so mama usually cooked at least two turkeys for each holiday dinner. That is why my mother had the largest ice cream maker she could buy, because when you have to supply desserts for maybe 20 to 24 people, that is a lot of ice cream. That’s where I came in as the”motor”that cranked that infernal contraption ! Thanksgiving day dinners started early at our house back then. Mom always usually up by three or 330 in morning, rousting me out of bed by at least 4 AM. By 430 in the morning my dad was back from the icehouse with two 50 pound blocks of ice that I started chipping up in a wash tub. By then mom had mixed up the ice cream, put it into the huge ice cream maker, iced and salted everything down with rock salt and I started cranking. It usually took until at least seven or 730 for the ice cream to freeze, then I made sure it was iced down and salted real good before I covered it with an old quilt and a piece of canvas to really get hard. The only saving grace of those mornings was the smells emanating from the kitchen. By 5 AM three of my aunts were there helping my mom fix a huge breakfast of hotcakes, biscuits, scrambled eggs, ham, bacon, sausage, and usually oatmeal and grits. Also there was coffee, milk, hot chocolate, and fresh orange juice. After my mom fix the ice cream mixture for me, she always mixed up the dough for the dinner rolls that evening. She had a huge porcelain bowl that was blue in color, and probably hold at least 2 gallons, that she would put the dough in to rise. All I have to do is close my eyes and I can still smell that dough rising on a cold morning, Thanksgiving or not. Those are the great memories of Thanksgiving past.
My worst Thanksgiving memory was in 1984 when my uncle Jack, my mom’s youngest brother died of a massive heart attack that morning. For the next 10 years I hated to see Thanksgiving come around, but that has been 32 years now and I have learned to deal with it. We never get over it, we just get better. Which brings me to my most memorable Thanksgiving of 1993.
By this time, my parents were advanced in age and in their early 80s and our family had been scattered to the winds geographically, as families do as they get older. I called my parents in early October of 1993 and told them that I was going to take them out for Thanksgiving dinner so my mother would not have to cook for a bunch of people. She was more than willing to accept my invitation, so on Thanksgiving morning of 1993 I loaded my car with my youngest daughter Susan, my granddaughter Janeva who was four years old, and my girlfriend Susan and we headed to grass Valley California, and the Holbrooke Hotel to meet with my parents, my sister Frances and her oldest son Andrew. We had a most wonderful dinner that day with turkey and all the trimmings, with choice of three desserts so I had one of each. That was the first time my mother had ever been out for a dinner on Thanksgiving day. We all enjoyed it immensely especially mom. I didn’t know it at the time, but my mother was in the first stages of Alzheimer’s disease, and early the next year they moved to San Jose so my mother could receive advanced treatment. That was the last Thanksgiving dinner I got to share with my parents and for that I’m thankful. However sad that memory may be for me sometimes, looking back over the years I can recall a lot of good wonderful memories as well. Especially the one when my aunt Anna Lou, my dad’s older sister, said to my mother over dessert one Thanksgiving day; Angela, I can never get over how you always manage to have this wonderful homemade ice cream for dessert every year! She had said that to my mom for at least the previous 10 years, and finally I couldn’t hold back telling her; aunt Anna Lou, it is because I get out there and crank that damn ice cream freezer for three hours ! That’s why you have that big bowl of ice cream in front of you ! By this time in my life I was 16 years old and stood 6’2″ tall and weighed 210 pounds. My dad gave me one of those,”you shouldn’t have said that”looks, but there was also a hint of a smile on his face as well. I guess that makes it a pretty memorable Thanksgiving as well, don’t you think? Fast-forward to Christmas of 1955. By this time of my life I had graduated from high school in June of that year, went to work full time at the state hospital in November as a psychiatric technician. When I got my first paycheck in December of 55 the first thing I did was purchase an electric ice cream freezer for my mom. The best money I ever spent.
