The taste of the meal has a direct correlation to the quality of the company (our meal was 5-Star).
Banana Cream Pie for breakfast should be a regular thing.
Perfectly carving a turkey is over-rated. It just looks like carnage five minutes later anyway.
Watching my daughter and grandchildren have fun makes me happy in ways I cannot express.
There are few things as wonderful as hearing belly-laughter over three different things in three different rooms.
Apparently, fresh-made cranberry sauce is only meant for leftovers, because this is the 2nd year in a row I’ve forgotten to put it out with the meal until the meal was nearly over.
Family has little to do with blood and everything to do with commitment. These people are my people.
Those pictures of elegantly set dining rooms on Instagram are sort of like thumbing through National Geographic. Interesting to see how other cultures live, but not something you can even relate to when 1/3 of your guests are under the age of three.
Who the hell wants to wash that much china anyway?
I can be delighted that my son is off having the adventures a 24-year-old is supposed to be off having and still wish he was here with us instead.
If an adult spit chewed food in your hand, you’d need to see a therapist. But when it comes from a 19-month-old it’s no big thing . . . even if the 19-month-old isn’t your own.
If you want to give a (social) dog the equivalent of a hangover, surround him with at least 30 people who are willing to pet him all day.
We all possess one infinite resource, and that is love. There is no limit to how much love we can give nor how many people we can share it with.
Good families get along nicely at Thanksgiving. Great families look for excuses to get together for a big meal many times throughout the year.
There is nothing more calming to a young parent than hanging out with other young parents and seeing how their children behave. Yes, your children are all normal.
Thanksgiving isn’t a space out of time. People show up with their lives-in-process. They bring excitement and an appetite, and they also come with recent loss, current challenges, and any number of preoccupations. The best gatherings take us in exactly how we are, and over the course of the day buff out the cracks and soften the edges.
You’re not supposed to drink the shot. You’re supposed to toss the shot, then taste the after-glow.
If you want an extended family to thrive beyond its first two generations, give the children the example of adults who love, enjoy, and accommodate one another.
Rubber gloves can be a subject of much mirth.
After 20 years my wife can still surprise me, still makes me laugh, and is my favorite person to hang out with alone or in a crowd.
You know the children are having fun when adults start whipping out their cell phones to check their decibel-level apps.
Intellectually I accept that my nieces and nephews (blood, married-in, stepped-in, doesn’t matter) have many families to please on Thanksgiving. Emotionally, selfishly, I want them all here with us. I feel their absence.
That moment when you look around and see the people you love most in the world having a great time; laughing, listening to one another, holding each other’s children and grandchildren.
