A Sense of the Sacred*

Today at the butt crack of dawn, I began preparations to roast my first holiday turkey. (Our immediate family and Will's sister's family will be out of town for Thanksgiving, so we're going to do that meal here today after the Kentucky game. Go Dawgs and pass the stuffing.) I stripped and chopped thyme and marjoram leaves from my garden, zested a couple of oranges, chopped celery and onions and carrots. And as I worked in my warm, earthy-smelling kitchen, I felt behind me the long line of women stretching back to antiquity who have completed the rituals of harvesting and feeding. How lucky, I thought, to have been born to a woman who understood and embraced this ritual.

My mother understands the power and complexity associated with food and its preparation. Every birthday in our family, no matter what her bank statement told her, was celebrated with a meal of the birthday person's choice. (Mine, in case you were wondering, is usually fried chicken with milk gravy, rice, lima beans, and biscuits. Recent years have added an Italian cream cake to the end of the meal.) Holiday meals are not complete without sugar cookies made with the recipe from the Amy Vanderbilt cookbook washed down with a mug (or seven) of wassail. When Mama decided to stop making her biscuits from scratch, the earth shook and birds fell from the sky. She started making them again because she fears what will happen to the order of the Universe if she stops.

My father's mother understood this power, too. I remember sitting around piles and drifts of peas and corn with her and my mother and aunts, shelling and shucking and talking. I remember her saying, "Here, sug--pronounced 'shoog', as in sugar--" and handing me a half stick of gum before we went to pick blackberries. She always ate her cheese toast with rye and swiss and she loved sharing her afternoon coffee with her children and their spouses. I miss her so much around the holidays.

There are some that say that the idea of women puttering around the kitchen and cleaning up after a huge holiday meal is a sort of insult, that it hearkens back to the days of housedresses and heels. But it goes back further than that. I believe--and I draw great strength and peace from it--that when women gather to prepare a meal for their loved ones, they are renewing their tie to the time when the Mysteries were feminine. The rituals of stirring and spicing and sharing tastes of the sauces evoke eons spent gathered around a sacred flame.

Of course, ain't nobody I know going to take off their clothes and start chanting while they make a green bean casserole. I know I got pretty esoteric there for a minute, but I've really been thinking a lot about this lately. It's true that many of the men I know and love cook. Daddy has always cooked. Vince can pretty much cook me under a table. Gabe goes to great pains not to make a "packy" pound cake. Hayden does wonders with cheese, Heath has a potato salad that comes close to mine, and Hartwell is known for his...inventiveness in the kitchen. Jeffrey is showing interest in mixing and concocting. Even Will can throw down and cook a big breakfast.

The thing is, it's not done with any sense of the ritual of it. Men don't gather around and talk about their problems as they chop peppers for chili. They don't hand out advice about child-raising as they roll out biscuits. They don't discuss their first real love or awesome skin care products or the latest book they read as they wash up the dishes from supper. These are women things. They are the legacy of our times around the fire.

As the holidays draw closer, I can't wait to spend time in the kitchen with the women I love. I remember as a child listening to the laughter and chatter coming from that wonderful-smelling room and looking forward to a time when I wasn't just a kid underfoot, but was instead an integral part of all of that business and joy. When I finally did step in, it was as cool as I thought it would be. Bumping into each other as the dishes get filled, critically rolling spoonfuls of soup around our mouths, rubbing shoulders as we empty the sink for the third time: I love working with these women to prepare the meals that make everybody so happy and create so many wonderful memories.

And as the years go by and my girlie grows, she too will sneak peeks into the kitchen and watch her elders with envy as we laugh and stir and wipe. And someday, she'll join us and add her recipes to the traditions and rituals. I can't wait for that time, either

Here's hoping that all of you have a lovely Thanksgiving filled with all of the traditions that bring you and your family joy.

*from Joyce Carol Oates