Giving the Peace Sign

The things you have to do at Thanksgiving.

When asked to fill out a foil "leaf" with what I was thankful for and hang it on a small brass tree, I reduced my gratitude to its simplest level: I am grateful for all the people who love me. And I am.

While I've always been thankful for devoted parents, siblings who can finish my childhood stories and friends who choose to spend time with me, this year's list got longer with the addition of Mr. Wright, a partner who not only braved the gauntlet of meeting my family, but talked me down after the madness ended.

Part of how he accomplished this, it should be noted, was by ensuring that the three mornings after Turkey Day all involved waking up on the water. Those who know me know that this is a sure-fire way to get me to my happy place.

Now that I think about it, I didn't get my usual pre-sisters stress zit, either, so maybe his presence in my life is working in myriad ways.

To prepare for the psychological demands of spending the day with family, I'd made a point to do my usual Thanksgiving Eve blowout with Holmes and Beloved.

Beginning at Acacia, where the vibe was low-key and quiet but the crab fritters, grilled mahi mahi and beet/feta salad (the latter so good it won over the beet-hating Holmes) and chocolate cremeux were stellar, and then at Holmes' man-cave, where we listened to countless records - Elvis Costello to the Zombies - our evening was devoted to toasting the ghosts of Thanksgivings past with Graham Beck Brut Rose.

It's a tradition that goes back to 2010 for the three of us and shows no signs of letting up, no matter where any of us wind up having our turkey.

Come Thanksgiving Day, we motored to the house of Sister #6, a true hostess with the mostess and it's not only because her celebrations involve her husband shucking Old Saltes for anyone who will slurp them, although I'll be honest, that is my favorite part of it all. I'd stand there chatting with him, slurping 3 or 4 oysters and then taking 3 shucked beauties up to my Dad before returning to do it all over again. And again.

Because the 30 family members in attendance were seated at four tables over three rooms, my sister had come up with a plan for FFF - that's forced family fun, a phrase I first learned on a bev nap - to shake things up. Someone would get up, plate and glass in hand, and tap someone else on the shoulder, thereby usurping their chair and changing the make-up of that table.

The purpose, she claimed, was for everyone to get a chance to sit at the table with my parents, but I'm not sure she ran that plan by them first. I know that by the time I got to the fourth table, everyone was either in a food coma or tired of talking, which is saying a lot for this group.

All I'm saying is, it can be exhausting to eat and drink for seven hours with family.

But Black Friday dawned in Deale, Maryland, a little town on the Chesapeake Bay that offered up a big marina and, after a drive through its nearly empty waterfront streets, a cozy lunch (because they'd stopped serving breakfast five minutes before we'd arrived) at the South Country Cafe, a place where the cashier calls you "hon" and a stack of housemade pies sat on a ledge near the door.

Carter's Creek provided the wake-up water-views come the weekend, along with the usual pleasures of small-town life in Irvington. A walk to the Local Cafe for a bagel meant seeing lots of visitors to the Tides Inn and Hope and Glory Inn out and about on inn bicycles, a holiday market going on at the Steamboat Museum and, promptly at noon, a steady rain that ensured a snug, indoor afternoon.

Best of all, I'd brought along one of my recent  library book sale finds, a petite blue edition of "The Playboy Interviews with John Lennon and Yoko Ono" from 1981, a book guaranteed to occupy me for as long as it took for Mr. Wright to gather reference materials for an upcoming course he's teaching.

From the executive editor's foreword to the interviewer's introduction, I was immediately taken with these extensive conversations between John, Yoko and the Playboy writer because Lennon was willing to talk about everything. In fact, that had been the starting point for the book because the magazine interview couldn't include a fraction of what the couple had shared over multiple interviews and it was such good stuff.

That said, after reading for less than two hours, I pulled that chenille blanket over me and took a rainy day nap the likes of which can only be explained as sleeping out the final vestiges of Thanksgiving Day stress.

Post-rain, we headed to the Quays, an upscale Irish pub, meaning the fried fish fillets were mahi mahi and served over rice/quinoa instead of with chips, but also the sort of place where an appetizer of Dublin rolls (corned beef and cabbage in eggroll wrappers) arrived long after our entrees and not that far ahead of some pretty tasty butterscotch bread pudding.

Northern Neck charm or clueless management? You make the call.

From there, we only had to cross the hall to Walkabout Creek, where a DJ was onstage, lights were flashing and the locals were just getting cranked up for some serious Saturday night dancing, first to country, then to pop and hip-hop, and fortunately, with enough classic soul thrown in to get us up there, too.

Everybody dance now.

Today dawned so warm and sunny that all indoor activity was suspended so we could make the most of such late-November splendor. My walk took me across the grounds of the Dog and Oyster Winery and through their back 40, depositing me on the main drag which, as I quickly leaned, meant waving to every Sunday driver that passed.

While Mr. Wright assures me that in my short, pink athletic skirt, no one was going to take me for a local, I am nonetheless working on getting just the right Northern Neck wave mastered.

That and 79 cents will get me a copy of the Rappahannock Record at the gas station.

Down at the dock, the creek was muddy from yesterday's rain and the tide so high that it felt like we were on a boat. While checking the oyster garden float, we found it full of pine needles but no bivalves because apparently a storm had broken the frame and released the bottom.

Mr. Wright was the brilliant one who suggested that maybe a new oyster reef will form with the escapees, perhaps just beside the dock for easy shucking and slurping. If so, it'll give me one more thing to be thankful for next year.

Not that I need anything more given how good I have it these days. Like Reba McEntire said, "I have a lot to be thankful for. I am healthy, happy and I am loved."

Finally, the trifecta. Now if I could just nail how to wave to passing trucks, I wouldn't ask for anything more.

A Teachable Turkey Moment

Yet again, pure coincidence took me down a rabbit hole.

Waking up to a colder-than-necessary Thanksgiving Day, I nevertheless headed down to the river for a walk. Like Thanksgiving days past, the city was eerily silent with next to no traffic and few cars parked in Jackson Ward or downtown.

People are gone, baby, gone.

I was within spitting distance of home when I passed my car on a side street and, knowing there was plenty of parking right in front of my apartment, decided to move it. It wasn't like it would have been a far walk to the car, so there was really no compelling reason for me to climb in and re-park.

Except that the moment I started the car, it was filled with the sound of a monologue-type song I didn't know, though the voice and nature of the song caught my ear. Did I know it? If I did, my brain wasn't sure what I was hearing, so I sat and listened to find out who and what it was.

Turns out it was Arlo Guthrie's "Alice's Restaurant Massacree," which apparently has been played as a Thanksgiving tradition on radio for decades because the lyrics involve a real life littering incident that happened to him on Thanksgiving 1965.

I'm seeing a pattern. Earlier this week, I'd seen "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" and recognized none of it and now here I was hearing a song long associated with Thanksgiving yet new to me, except for the title.

Who am I and how have I missed out on these Thanksgiving Day classics?

Given that I'd heard the song on Thanksgiving and I had absolutely nothing to do until my turkey dinner at 4:00, I proceeded to research the 18-minute masterpiece that is the "Alice's Restaurant Massacree."

Not sure how much time I lost (best guess: a fair amount) to learning that not only had it been based on real events, but that the song's overall purpose was as an anti-Vietnam war protest song. Well, that explained all those lyrics I'd heard about the draft board inanity of refusing to induct him because his littering offense made him of questionable moral fiber to kill Vietnamese and burn villages.

All I can say is, thank you WNRN for upping my cultural literacy by playing a song I should have known about 40 years ago. I like to think I increased my Thanksgiving bona fides today because of it.

Turkey with all the trimmings was taken with my favorite musician at Camden's Orphans' Thanksgiving where the rule is you have to be a party of three or fewer because the chef believes if you have four or more, you should cook your own damn turkey. That said, we were seated next to a five-top and midway through our yams, a four-top sat down on the other side of us.

Clearly, the three person rule is up for interpretation.

But our dinner was pretty wonderful - though I'll always prefer stuffing with hot sausage - and after downing a fine salad of mesclun greens to clear the arteries for that was to come, we got down to the main event: turkey, dark and light, mashed potatoes and gravy, yams, stuffing and green bean casserole.

To wash it all down, I enjoyed a glass of Louis Latour "Cuvee Latour," a perfectly balanced white burgundy with an appealing floral nose that provided a refined note for such an all-American meal.

Only when it came to dessert did my dinner companion and I part ways. He was in an apple pie mood while no less than our server anticipated that I'd require chocolate pate. "And I know not to take your plate until you've cleared the last crumb off it," she joked, referencing the one time she reached for it when I had a bite or two left and was merely taking a breather.

The smart ones learn so I don't have to resort to using my fork as a defensive weapon.

We rolled out of there - leftover turkey sandwiches in hand - as the next wave was settling in, although I pity anyone trying to eat a meal that substantial so long after sunset.

Like Arlo sang, I had a Thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat. Another thing the two of us have in common is long-winded opinions.

And now I know how much I've got to be thankful for - though perhaps not quite as much as in past years - since unlike Arlo, I've never been arrested for littering.

I may finally be up to Thanksgiving speed.

My Dinner with Strangers

I credit a yellow Siegel's Ham apron and the Curtis Mayfield radio station with carrying me through Thanksgiving with soul and style.

For the 3rd annual Orphans' Thanksgiving, I volunteered as a server, lugging platters loaded with turkey and gravy, mashed and sweet potatoes, Brussels sprouts and top-on carrots, cranberries and stuffing and so ridiculously heavy it felt like I was carrying a small child atop the platter.

There were the usual odd demands ("I can't eat lettuce, so can I have a spinach salad instead?"), adorable couples (two bottles of Avinyo Pettilant and a celebration of it being no family, just them) and a lecherous man trying to get his drink on as quickly as possible ("I'll have a Leffe Blonde beer and a glass of Cotes du Rhone right away") while throwing sexual innuendo my way (caught it, returned it and moved on).

I had a ball watching as a trio of girlfriends moved through their wining and dining right into a food coma, occasionally joining in their discussions of womanhood circa 2015 and subsequent laughter about almost everything.

Best of all, few people hurried through their turkey day feast. There was lingering, there was non-stop conversation and there was plenty of spirited imbibing. Unlike at Grandma's, no one had to watch their intake lest they say something that might set off a relative's ire, so it felt more like an extended dinner party.

By 7:00, the last few people were finally moving on to whatever it is people do on Thanksgiving night. Me, I finally had my gravy-laden feast accompanied by several wines and a piece of non-traditional chocolate pate pie slathered in fresh whipped cream.

Another Thanksgiving in the rear view mirror of life. Of course I'm thankful for my interesting little life. Do I desire more? Hell, yes.

More, Sir?

Orphans need to give thanks, too.

And by orphans, I mean all those people whose families are either too far away or are far too annoying to want to bother with on this most American of holidays. Holiday orphans.

At Camden's tonight, orphans were defined as any party of three or less; the chef's thinking was that if you had at least four, you could cook your own bird. Some people like to be the boss of everyone.

Fortunately for this orphan, I'd gotten an offer too good to refuse. A full Thanksgiving dinner for me, followed by helping a pro serve other orphans for a few hours. A chance to pay it forward, so to speak.

The only thing wrong with this picture is that I have absolutely no serving experience. Nada. Zip. But who's going to complain about the service at Thanksgiving? Do you give your Mom a hard time when she's slow in getting the stuffing on the table? When Uncle Bill takes too long to carve? Probably not.

By having my meal before the orphans showed up, I was able to speak with authority about what I was serving. Well, except to the woman who said she'd have fish instead of turkey. (Sound of record screeching) Do you see any fish on that menu, lady? There's no fish here on Thanksgiving.

What they did have was a handsome and hearty green salad (to clear the arteries for what was to come) followed by succulent smoked turkey - the skin crispy, salty and full of flavor - with all the usual suspects: mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green beans and pearl onions, cranberry relish, gravy and the carb lover's dream, stuffing.

Of course, the stuffing wasn't as good as my family's but how could it be with no pork sausage in it? Does anyone not prefer their own family's stuffing?

Before I'd even finished my meal, orphans began showing up despite the fact that dinner wasn't going to be served for another half hour. It was an understanding bunch, though, and they made do with beer and wine until it was time to feed them.

From then on, the evening became a jigsaw puzzle (where to seat everyone), a memory exercise (who wanted the Cotes du Rhone, who wanted the IPA?) and a hand/eye test (not enough experience pouring ice water from a pitcher).

In the interest of full disclosure, I let all the orphan tables know I was a neophyte with no serving experience so that their expectations wouldn't be too high. As a result, I was lavished with praise for not doing worse than I did.

What I excelled at was talking to the orphans and finding out why they were there. More than half said they'd opted out of family, even though they were close enough to visit. Fair enough. Orphaning by choice is a real thing.

A woman sitting at the bar got a text mid-meal from her sister saying she'd been proposed to. Another had come alone for the second year, having enjoyed last year's orphan meal so much. A wine rep brought his crew of two. Another wine pro brought one, was joined by a third and then got a text saying a fourth was on the way.

Whoa there, mister. There are no four tops at an orphans' Thanksgiving. They left to find a non-orphans' dinner.

Things were crazy busy for the next couple of hours as orphans continued to arrive, eat and depart with their turkey sandwich for tomorrow. One woman was so touched when I dropped off her table's sandwiches that she teared up. "That's the nicest thing I ever heard of," she said with a catch in her voice.

I was asked to mediate a debate about sweet potatoes versus yams. Not the same thing, I clarified. She gave me a high five and he scowled. At least we're learning something at this table tonight.

Dropping off a drink order to a couple, I took up their menus, reminding them that there were no choices tonight. "What if I don't like that?" he joked. Feel free to walk out that door and find yourself another orphans' Thanksgiving, I suggested. They grinned and stayed.

I had all the power (if none of the skill), especially with the scent of smoked turkey and gravy wafting out from the kitchen. They wanted what I could deliver.

Make no mistake, I had no idea what I was doing, but the real server was good enough to teach me terminology, tell me where to find certain beers and express appreciation for whatever I did.  In the ultimate compliment, when she was in the weeds and completely overwhelmed, she told me she'd have killed herself if I hadn't been there to help.

Pretty heady stuff for a novice server.

Three hours in, we began to run out of food. Peach crisp was the first casualty, but nobody complained about the pumpkin pie made extra creamy with Paula Deen's suggestion of adding cream cheese. By the time the last guest - celebrating his birthday today - arrived, we had exactly enough gravy for him and not one ladle more.

Only once he got to his dessert course did I sit down and have mine: chocolate pate, not an option for the walk-in orphans but available to the stopgap help.

Which, after being in constant motion serving orphans for four hours was about the nicest thing I'd ever heard of.

That would be just one of several things for which this orphan is thankful this year.

Praise Be

If the field at Abner Clay Park is filled with weekend warriors playing a Turkey Bowl, it must be Thanksgiving Day.

The other clue that the annual day of gluttony has arrived is that my neighborhood is deserted.

Wednesday evening I was in the Museum District and parking was impossible to find. Apparently all the turkey-serving grandmothers live there and all the starving students live here.

And there's really no other day that I begin by frying up a pound of hot breakfast sausage to go with the multiple sticks of butter that go into making stuffing, this year my only contribution to the big meal that defines the day...and leaves my apartment smelling delicious for hours.

Having a glass of wine at a not-so neighborhood bar, I met a couple who stopped for a snack before hitting the road for the Outer Banks to meet up with friends.

The time spent eating their mini-feast - smoked trout, housemade pickles, turkey, crackers- both fortified them and gave us a chance to get acquainted.

Because they lived in Washington and because that's my hometown, we found lots to discuss.

They live in Shaw, so they recommended their favorite Ethiopian restaurant. I told them I'm on my way to D.C. Sunday and they wanted to hear what my plans were.

Eat, art, eat, art, eat, art... they got the idea and we got off on a tangent about the under-appreciated Building Museum, one of their favorites and one of my destinations Monday.

I met a policeman who claimed he didn't like yams but gobbled them up for the first time today, acknowledging that perhaps it was the simple preparation that won him over.

There was a woman who started talking about how bad Virginia wines were until a friend (who, after years of wearing glasses, doesn't anymore and so I'm still getting used to seeing his face naked) with superior Virginia wine knowledge started a small campaign to inform her, leading off with Cardinal Point "Green" as a good entry point.

Since the last time I was at Cardinal Point, after doing the tasting, my date and I chose "Green" as the bottle we bought and took outside to enjoy on that sunny afternoon, I seconded his recommendation.

And of course, I ate a fabulous turkey meal, made all the more so because I didn't have to cook it; making stuffing doesn't count because it's really just an excuse to pick at the sausage and onion cooking in the pan.

As for what I'm thankful for, it's probably the same things we were all appreciating today.

Family and friends. Health. Sunny skies and occasional rainy days. Music and art, theater, poetry and anything else that entertains and/or makes me feel. Random conversations with strangers...and non-strangers. A funny man who can crack up an eccentric woman.

To paraphrase Woody Allen, I am thankful for laughter, except when milk wine comes out my nose.

Pilgrim's Progress

Do I think our forefathers took seven hours to eat a meal?

No, but I don't think their meal began with a Kir Royale, either.

Amour was doing a dinner of Thanksgiving flavors from Virginia and pairing a French wine and a Virginia wine with each course.

One long table, beautifully set, a group of mostly strangers who ended up being friendly enough to make it a party by the end, and a congenial host who made a game of which wine was which.

I had a blast.

The first course was scallop and chestnut-wrapped  in bacon with a flat leaf parsley vinaigrette, paired with Jefferson Vineyards Pinot Gris and Fritsch Pinot Gris.

Almost everyone was surprised that the sweeter wine was the Alsatian.

For the endive salad with walnuts, duck cracklings and beet vinaigrette, we savored Boxwood Estate Topiary Rose, a personal favorite, and Perle de Roseline Rose, which was even lovelier.

The most creative course was the next, a Pilgrim's Purse, Amour's take on a beggar's purse.

The filling had lobster and cream and although we were told to just bite into it, most of us used a utensil to prevent cream from running down our chins.

Our main course surely beat anything the Pilgrims (or those at Berkeley Plantation, the real first Thanksgiving) enjoyed all those years ago.

Roast breast of pheasant and duck with balsamic cranberry and rosemary glaze was served with spoon bread and roasted root veggies.

Spoon bread was a staple of my childhood thanks to my Richmond grandmother, but I rarely get it anymore, so that was a real treat.

Domaine de Rothschild and Boxwood Estate "Boxwood" fought it out with this course and both were excellent.

I'd probably give the edge to the Boxwood, a blend of Cab Sauvignion, Merlot and Petit Verdot, just to represent.

By this course, there were no longer any strangers at the table and meat was moving from the plates of people who were full to those who still had room (read: guys).

Next came Virginia cheeses with autumn fruit compote and I'd go with the Grayson as my favorite; its sheer beefy stinkiness reminds me of a version of our very own Virginia Taleggio.

With the cheeses we had Domaine Ricard Le Vilain p'tit Rouge and White Hall Vineyards Monticello.

By this time, we were toasting our new acquaintance, the birthday girl.

We finished up our gluttony with a seasonal trio of desserts: spiced pumpkin mousse, apple sorbet with sage-honey drizzle and a chocolate pecan barquette.

Perhaps in a nod to our host's Alsatian roots, we got our bubbles on with Lucien Albrecht Blanc de Blanc and from the Old Dominion, what else but Thibault Janisson Virginia Fizz?

By that point, one girl was shooting video of the merriment at the table.

John the magician had set up shop outside and the females among the group went out there to be entertained with tricks while the male contingent stayed put.

In another time, I suppose they would have been smoking cigars while we retired to the drawing room.

When we came back in one by one, someone looked at the time only to discover that we were now at the seven-hour point for this meal.

In the interest of blood circulation and allowing owner Paul to finally close his restaurant on a day he's not even typically open, we began to leave.

And with the misguided logic of people replete with terrific food and wine, we went directly to Secco for more good wine.

Our group was small enough by that point to take over the couches and lounge (I'm not sure we were capable of much more) whilst enjoying Pierre Paillard Brut (chosen by the wine geek among us) and the Marrugat Cava Brut because the birthday girl wanted it.

When the remaining lot of us headed out on to Cary Street, it was way past midnight but the temperate air made for nice strolling weather.

One by one, we peeled off to our cars, cabs and the walker to his neighborhood.

I have no doubt that every one of us was thankful for so much good food and wine, and unlike our forefathers, enjoyed with no threat of hostile native interference.

Ha! Only because Sweet Frogs was closed by then.

More Than a Meal

It may have been my favorite Thanksgiving day ever, mainly because it strayed from the norm and I got to enjoy so much more than just the big meal.

But of course the big meal is important and I was having a half dozen people over, so I made the stuffing and got the bird in the oven and then headed to the VMFA with friends for an afternoon of "Corot to Cezanne: French Drawings from the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon."

With 75 works showing, there was plenty to see by mostly familiar names and, in most cases, stylistically quite similar to each artist's more developed or painterly works.

The pleasure was in getting up close and personal with each gem.

Vuillard's emphasis on the patterning of walls was just as striking in these pieces as in his oils and Raoul Dufy's trademark washes of color just as identifiable.

The largest work, Picasso's "Jester on Horseback" was done in oil on composition board, but still conveyed a strong sense of line.

Van Gogh's two pieces showed the undeniable influence of Japanese woodcuts and Degas' drawings were, not surprisingly, of jockeys and horses.

I was a bit surprised at the number of people besides us who'd decided to gallery walk on a Thanksgiving afternoon.

One woman walked up to a security person and said, "Thank you for being here so we could see art on this holiday."

That very thought had occurred to me but I hadn't vocalized it.

After such a satisfying afternoon, it was a pleasure to come home to the smell of a roasting turkey and await my additional guests.

I enlisted a couple of friends to peel potatoes and the Deer Run Farm carrots I'd gotten at the Renegade Byrd House Market (along with their spaghetti squash and beans) and before long, the rest of the group had arrived.

I read once that the problem with having Thanksgiving at someone's house other than your family's is that the stuffing is never right, but all of my guests seemed satisfied with mine.

That, or the wine was flowing well enough that no one noticed it wasn't just like home.

My guests lingered until around 8:30, at which point I changed clothes and headed to Ipanema for a Triple D party (drinks, dessert and dancing).

I can't say that I've ever had Thanksgiving night plans, but it was really the perfect way to spend the evening.

The hostess had made a party tape for the ages, spanning everything from "Temptation Eyes" to "Young Turks" to "Rapper's Delight" and "P.Y.T." with Britney Spears, Prince and John Cougar Mellencamp in between.

Awesome beyond belief and oh-so-danceable.

Desserts ranged from s'more pie to sweet potato pie, to hummingbird cake to chocolate cream pie and easily a half dozen more.

And yes there was pumpkin cheesecake for the semi-traditionalists.

I had a great time playing photographer with my friend's boyfriend's camera.

Moving around the dance floor, behind the bar and even standing on the bench, I was able to capture all kinds of things.

Kissing couples, a guy doing his best male stripper imitation holding a ceiling pipe, a whitest guy dance-off, you name it, I shot it.

No doubt there will be a lot of incriminating moments caught on pixels when those pictures are viewed tomorrow.

And since I didn't become the shutterbug until well into the party, I'm afraid I'll see a few cringe-worthy shots of myself.

Not that I'm worried in the least about any documentation of tonight.

As I told my friend on leaving, this had to be my best Thanksgiving day ever.

How did it take me so long to figure out that art, music and dancing are what I should be thankful for on this day?

Incriminating pictures notwithstanding.

Being a Renegade at the Byrd House Market

I wanted to get as many local foodstuffs for my Thanksgiving feast as possible, so I went to the renegade Byrd House Market this afternoon to see what I could score.

I had no real idea of how many vendors would be there or what they might have, especially given the gloomy, damp weather but it was worth a shot.

I have to say that I think I would get the locavore stamp of approval for my purchases.

I found several bunches of carrots for glazing with butter and brown sugar, potatoes for mashing, sweet potatoes because it's T-day, and perhaps yummiest of all, Brussels Sprouts and beets (and local goat cheese) for roasting.

I know a lot of people are not fans of Brussels Sprouts, but when they're roasted in bacon fat and then mixed with the cooked bacon, walnuts and a little salt and pepper, they're magnificent, whether you're a fan or not (rule of thumb: bacon makes everything better).

Given what a local meal the first Thanksgiving was (and we all know it was at Berkley Plantation and not Plymouth; the Pilgrims just had better P.R.) I thought I did pretty well in gathering a terrific representation of Virgina's finest for my Thanksgiving table.

And, yes, even the bacon is Shenandoah Valley local, from Polyface Farms.

Plymouth?

Bah! It's Virginia's bounty that will define my Thanksgiving meal.