The Most Entertaining Cozy Mystery Author You Never Heard Of!
Maggie Pill
The Most Entertaining Cozy Author You Never Heard Of!
Saturday, November 28, 2015
30 Days of Christmas-Day Four
Barb's Christmas Memories
I remember Christmas. We always went to our grandparents’
house for dinner. The times I remember best were when Faye and I were
around eight and nine. Our cousins were all boys, and
they lived in faraway Muskegon, so we seldom saw them. They were
rough-and-tumble types, and I never enjoyed their company much, though Faye was always
willing to play Monkey in the Middle or King of the Hill with them.
Dad and Uncle Marv, the sons-in-law, sat
in the living room,
smoking and swapping stories with Grandpa Lemmon. Mom, Aunt Marilyn, and
Grandma worked together in the kitchen, each preparing her signature
dishes.
Grandma cooked the turkey, filling it with spicy stuffing and making
delicious gravy from the drippings. Mom liked to do the salads, and I
would help her clean and slice vegetables for
tossed salad, pasta salad, potato salad, broccoli salad, and fruit
salad. Aunt
Mar was the side dish expert, and she’d bring a squash to roast, her
famous
brown-sugar beans, and some new recipe she’d gotten from her recipe-card
club.
I remember bits and pieces of the men's
conversations, mostly about agriculture or the hunting season just
completed. The women
talked of their children and the small irritations of mice in the house
and
stains on the linen tablecloth. Mom encouraged me to join in, but I
preferred to listen, peering into the world of adults. I could never see
my future as one of them, cooking for a dozen people and chatting about
curtains.
Did I despise their small-town lives and
homey talk? Never.
I loved feeling part of those dinners, though I knew even then it was
not be the
life for me. I didn’t feel they were wrong. I was the one who was
different, because I
didn’t long for a kitchen to cook in or children to tend. Still, I loved
watching them. They knew who they were. They knew what they were.
Christmas was my chance to observe, though it often felt as if I were
watching an alien
species.
I'm more like Faye than Barb when it comes to loving to cooking for my family. But I'm more like Barb in how i think about most things and being a Grammar Nazi. I really enjoy being with family at holiday gatherings but i also enjoy my alone time.
I had a cousin tell me not too long ago that she can't believe we're related, since I no longer cook--ever. I used to like doing the big meals at holidays when we were a big family. Now I let my husband enjoy that great feeling. :)
I'm more like Faye than Barb when it comes to loving to cooking for my family. But I'm more like Barb in how i think about most things and being a Grammar Nazi. I really enjoy being with family at holiday gatherings but i also enjoy my alone time.
ReplyDeleteI had a cousin tell me not too long ago that she can't believe we're related, since I no longer cook--ever. I used to like doing the big meals at holidays when we were a big family. Now I let my husband enjoy that great feeling. :)
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