Wake Up And Smell The Onions!

   Thanksgiving is all about tradition. As a kid, my family shared Thanksgiving with the Bivianos - our close family friends – for 12 years in a row.  In that spirit, I am repeating a column that appeared in this space last year. I’ll be back next week – I promise. In the meantime have a great Thanksgiving weekend.

   If there were a playoff to determine the best holiday, I believe Thanksgiving would have won the trophy in my home. Christmas was bigger but it was different every year.  Thanksgiving, on the other hand, was as predictable as turkey and stuffing.

   The holiday began early in my house with the sound of chopping and the smell of sautéed onions and celery. Mom’s preparation for the Super Bowl of cooking had begun.  We only enjoyed the smell every other year as we celebrated “home and away” with our old neighbors; the Bivianos. The early morning aroma of pies filled the house in off years.

   The kids’ day began with watching the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade on TV. The float characters may change but the parade is almost identical to the one we know today through television.

   A tradition in the northeast has been the high school football game on Thanksgiving morning.  This marked the end of the regular football season and usually pitted the biggest rivals for what would be the year’s best attended game.  Strangely, both families attended the Nutley – Kearney (NJ) game each year even though none of us lived there.  The Biviano’s “Uncle John” coached at Nutley High School so that was reason enough to attend.  Looking back, I believe the real reason was for the dads to just get the kids out of the house for a few hours while the iron chefs prepared dinner.

   They say that smells can be a strong memory trigger. That would explain why every time I smell roasting turkey, I am transported back to the moment we returned from those cold football games. The windows would literally be steamed from the oven and the aroma that hit you when the door opened was incredible.

   The turkey waiting game would now begin. The older brothers would settle in for some football while the dads discussed various home repair projects.  I never knew a steam radiator valve could be so captivating.  Being too young to care about football, I settled on playing  house or a board game with their youngest; Eva Marie. Our own tradition though was watching Laurel and Hardy’s “The March of the Wooden Soldiers,” which aired on a local station every Thanksgiving. 

   Regardless of who hosted the event, seating everyone for dinner was always a challenge. Table leaves and mismatched chairs consumed every available space in the dining room and kids were often pushed into the kitchen when extra relatives joined us.

   The dinner came at us in waves of big and small fancy dishes that we hadn’t seen since Easter. Looking back, just keeping all of the food warm was an accomplishment in the days before microwaves.

   The turkey and trimmings were magnificent of course no matter which house we celebrated at.  Their glory was matched only by the selection of pies and baked goods that followed them.

   In a time before political correctness, the dads would retire to the living room for more football, the kids would disappear upstairs to play records and the moms would wash a mountain of dishes.

   The long day wound down as the adults drank coffee in the living room and we stayed quiet upstairs hoping the grownups would forget how late it was.  Eventually the call upstairs came and we said our goodbyes as leftovers were stacked in our arms.

   Our two families followed this script for about fifteen years until college and later marriage got in the way.  Still, there isn’t a Thanksgiving Day that I don’t think of the Bivianos and the Carrolls and those crowded dining rooms.

   By the time you read this, mom may already be basting the turkey in your house. Give her a hug, wash a few dishes and have a Happy Thanksgiving!