I get to gratitude by the end
I’m writing this on my phone, from the couch at my mom’s house while the baby, who didn’t nap, watches something on the iPad and we all just try to make it to dinner. But I want to stick to a newsletter a week—so close to a perfect resolution!—and I have things I want to say and think through about Thanksgiving.
Our Thanksgiving got fucked this year by me coming down with Hand Foot and Mouth over the weekend. The baby isn’t sick, which made this weird, and so at first I thought my Covid booster triggered some immune thing that gave me a small outbreak of tiny warts on my hands. The next day I realized what it actually was, but not before freezing off one of the sores from the palm of my hand. Great.
I was lucky, it was a mild case, and it already cleared up. But adding a couple of days, coming down Friday instead of Wednesday, was extra safety, as was just seeing immediate family and not the larger, and older, thanksgiving crew. So we did small Thanksgiving at home, and a second-day version of it here.
HFM fucked Thanksgiving, but so did becoming a parent, a bit, too. So much of what I love is still there—parade and dog show, a spread of very specific special foods—but I realized I tricked myself out of holidays. Eventually we’ll probably take over hosting from my mom, or share, as is the way of children becoming adults—someday we might have a dining room!—but even if I’m not taking on the peak momdom of hosting—the prepping and working and planning and cooking and cooking and cooking—I don’t get to chill. I always thought I loved the secular festivity and the foods (I love the foods), but even when I helped cook the whole meal, Thanksgiving was a holiday of being taken care of. When I was very little, being taken care of entirely. But even older, the year I’d gotten into cooking and asked to do everything but the turkey, I was being taken care of by my mom—her grocery shopping, her expansive kitchen and six burners and countertops clean and smooth enough to roll out dough. (My Inwood apartment kitchen could never.) But this year made me realize the most obvious thing about parenthood: I have to take care of someone else, instead of someone taking care of me.
It’s so stupidly obvious, but I somehow never thought of these parts of parenting before I dove in, like how every holiday I would at most be able to chill for 1-2 hours at nap and after his bedtime (but even then it’s recovery and catching my breath). I mean I never planned to do this during a pandemic, I thought we’d have babysitters and nights out and nights off. But how often would we really? Am I imagining a life without the pandemic or a life where I was rich and could go on vacation?
I don’t know if this all sounds desperate or bleary or how obviously it’s the writing of a woman whose kid didn’t nap, who’s typing this with her thumbs with a cartoon in the background. She didn’t sleep well last night, either. (The bed is small and the dog woke up at 4am to trot out to poop on the living room floor.)
But I am, I should acknowledge and appreciate, typing this on my phone while the baby watches a cartoon, and while my mom cooks for me (and everyone). I haven’t cooked a thing in 24 hours, except for the apple crumble I wanted to make. I haven’t washed a dish. I’ve just chased around a toddler and a small dog. But my mom is making me dinner. Who ever makes her dinner? But at least she doesn’t have a toddler to chase around anymore, or when she does it’s a special treat.
I’m writing this on my phone, from the couch at my mom’s house while the baby, who didn’t nap, watches something on the iPad and we all just try to make it to dinner. But I want to stick to a newsletter a week—so close to a perfect resolution!—and I have things I want to say and think through about Thanksgiving.
Our Thanksgiving got fucked this year by me coming down with Hand Foot and Mouth over the weekend. The baby isn’t sick, which made this weird, and so at first I thought my Covid booster triggered some immune thing that gave me a small outbreak of tiny warts on my hands. The next day I realized what it actually was, but not before freezing off one of the sores from the palm of my hand. Great.
I was lucky, it was a mild case, and it already cleared up. But adding a couple of days, coming down Friday instead of Wednesday, was extra safety, as was just seeing immediate family and not the larger, and older, thanksgiving crew. So we did small Thanksgiving at home, and a second-day version of it here.
HFM fucked Thanksgiving, but so dis becoming a parent, a bit, too. So much of what I love is still there—parade and dog show, a spread of very specific special foods—but I realized I tricked myself out of holidays. Eventually we’ll probably take over hosting from my mom, or share, as is the way of children becoming adults—someday we might have a dining room!—but even if I’m not taking on the peak momdom of hosting—the prepping and working and planning and cooking and cooking and cooking—I don’t get to chill. I always thought I loved the secular festivity and the foods (I love the foods), but even when I helped cook the whole meal, Thanksgiving was a holiday of being taken care of. When I was very little, being taken care of entirely. But even older, the year I’d gotten into cooking and asked to do everything but the turkey, I was being taken care of by my mom—her grocery shopping, her expansive kitchen and six burners and countertops clean and smooth enough to roll out dough. (My Inwood apartment kitchen could never.) But this year made me realize the most obvious thing about parenthood: I have to take care of someone else, instead of someone taking care of me.
It’s so stupidly obvious, but I somehow never thought of these parts of parenting before I dove in, like how every holiday I would at most be able to chill for 1-2 hours at nap and after his bedtime (but even then it’s recovery and catching my breath). I mean I never planned to do this during a pandemic, I thought we’d have babysitters and nights out and nights off. But how often would we really? Am I imagining a life without the pandemic or a life where I was rich and could go on vacation?
I don’t know if this all sounds desperate or bleary or how obviously it’s the writing of a woman whose kid didn’t nap, who’s typing this with her thumbs with a cartoon in the background. She didn’t sleep well last night, either. (The bed is small and the dog woke up at 4am to trot out to poop on the living room floor.)
But I am, I should acknowledge and appreciate, typing this on my phone while the baby watches a cartoon, and while my mom cooks for me (and everyone). I haven’t cooked a thing in 24 hours, except for the apple crumble I wanted to make. I haven’t washed a dish. I’ve just chased around a toddler and a small dog. But my mom is making me dinner. Who ever makes her dinner? But at least she doesn’t have a toddler to chase around anymore, or when she does it’s a special treat.