I was ready for battle. I had my Gourmet magazine opened and all ingredients out with corresponding cutting boards and prep bowls. I had my list of things to do and exactly when to do them. Game on! And then, it happened. Somehow, sometime during that afternoon “This is going to be the most perfect Thanksgiving dinner ever made” became “You know, you could also do it THIS way” and “Why don’t you try a little of THIS or a little of THAT in the dish” and “Just because Gourmet doesn’t tell you to do it doesn’t mean you can’t do it!” My Dad stood in the kitchen with a huge Cheshire Cat grin on his face as I shrunk and became Vizzini the little “thinking man” from The Princess Bride trying to figure out which glass the poison was in.

I was enlightened. Yes, Gourmet puts together a nice Thanksgiving menu. Yes, if you follow the recipe, you pretty much can’t go wrong. And yes, I was an uptight New Yorker who couldn’t relax in her own kitchen! Thankfully, I was reminded what a beautiful thing it is just to be with loved ones on this glorious holiday.

Like Maura, once when I was a kid we decided to go out for Thanksgiving. We lived far from all our relatives, so typically it was just the four of us eating together. What a disaster. The first restaurant, we sat down and noticed that a number of the dishes on the table appeared to be dirty. We ended up walking out. The next restaurant, the power went out. At the last and final restaurant, they served pressed turkey. Yuk! Obviously we weren’t good at picking restaurants back then, but additionally – Thanksgiving is all about being at home, in front of the fire, with wonderful smells wafting through the house and the Macy’s Day Parade and then football on TV. I’m looking forward to it!

One year the Massachusetts group couldn’t make it so we were planning a small Thanksgiving with the family members from Williamsburg. My sister-in-law and I, in what we thought was a brilliant whim of easy planning, decided we would go out to a restaurant for dinner that year. We were very happy with this plan as it made for a relaxing visit with no stressful preparations or last minute grocery shopping.

During dinner at the restaurant my oldest nephew who was thirteen at the time, and who had been very quiet the whole day, started crying and said. “This doesn’t feel like Thanksgiving!”

We laugh about it now, but back then we had no idea how much the craziness of the day was all part of the tradition for him and all the kids. This year we are happily going to Williamsburg for Thanksgiving to enjoy the craziness.