The Substitute Kitchen

Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.

Robert Frost

I have photos of Sons #1 and #2, each aged 18-24 months old, wearing the same outfit—two years apart. The pictures show both boys fast asleep, face-down in their mashed potatoes on two different Thanksgiving Days. Yesterday, I picked up my grandson (different outfit, thank goodness), also two years-old, asleep head-first in the leftover fancy jello Daughter #1 made for Thanksgiving dinner. Of course, Thanksgiving dinner was quieter this year—only the people who live in the house at the moment, but the memories are just as vivid.

Years ago, my mother’s garbage disposal died the morning of Thanksgiving. In his typical single-minded enthusiasm for problem solving, my husband took out the old disposal—without considering that not having a sink might be a deterrent to holiday preparations. He spent the morning at the local building supply (yep, it was open!) browsing happily through a maze of new disposal options and came home with the perfect solution. Then he crawled under the sink and begin the installation. Six feet tall, his body hung out of the cupboard across most of the kitchen, requiring that the cooks—my mother, my sister-in-law, my dad, and I–step over him every time we had to reach for dishes, or measuring cups, or large Cokes to dull our headaches.

The installation was not without its difficulties. The first time he turned the water on, it spewed water all over the floor from a leaking connection in the drainpipe. No problem. He took unhooked the disposal and started over. Fortunately, the actual dinner interrupted this step, and he had to quit to give thanks for the blessings of that year. It was, as always, a lovely meal with appropriate leftover turkey for the green chili enchiladas which would highlight the next day’s dinner.

My husband has a legendary ability to eat. Once when we were first married, I put dinner on the table for him and rushed off to a meeting, telling him I’d eat when I got home. Two hours later, I searched the fridge for my half of the meal. “Oh,” he said in surprise. “I didn’t know you made any for you, so I just ate it all.” Now days, all 27 grandchildren know that if their parents require them to clean their plates before they leave the table, they can surreptitiously slide whatever it is they are gagging over onto Grandpa’s plate, and he’ll eat it, no matter how it looks or what the contents.

That dinner at my mom’s house was no different. He thoroughly enjoyed the meal, but he was a little overstuffed when he climbed back under the cupboard to finish the garbage disposal install. After twisting around trying to get his very full tummy in a comfortable spot, he gave up and declared he needed a nap. He staggered off to bed, leaving my sister-in-law and I with a kitchen covered in pots and pans, plus china, crystal goblets, and silver for a dozen sitting on the table.

She looked at me, and I looked at her. We started to laugh; then we dug the Comet cleanser and a couple of scrubbing brushes out from under the mess by the sink and headed for the bathroom. She was pregnant at the time, so leaning over the tub was physically impossible. I scrubbed. She sprayed. When the tub was sparkling and sanitized to our satisfaction, my brothers began an assembly line from the table to the bathroom and back. (Now I know what my great grandmother’s life must have been like as she bent over a steaming metal tub to wash clothes in the front yard. “Back-breaking” is a more app description that I had imagined.)

There was a good deal of groaning, laughing, and spraying of unsuspecting relatives carrying dirty dishes. My sister-in-law sat on the toilet to dry the crystal—as incongruous a picture as I have ever seen.

After his nap, my husband took another couple of hours to finish the disposal installation. Good news: the garbage went down the drain effectively for years afterward.  My husband never asked what happened to the dirty dishes; I don’t think he even noticed they had disappeared.

Memorable Thanksgivings in our family always include that one. As it should. When we give thanks, number one on our list is “family”. We’re all in it together—despite the dirty dishes and the ugly bumps that make up every life worth remembering.