Guest View: Passing Thanksgiving Baton to a New Generation

Summary

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MOST women well remember the first Thanksgiving feast they hosted. Many put it up there with their first kiss or having a baby. It is monumental and only women who have pulled it off can enter the sisterhood. Eventually, seasoned Thanksgiving cooks pass the baton to the new generation, usually a daughter or daughter-in-law. They do so with understanding and sympathy. That first time at bat on Thanksgiving is intimidating.

I admit I went a little overboard when I prepared my first Thanksgiving feast. I had it at my home, a "starter" house in the truest sense of the word. It was 1976 and the 800-square-foot house had a linoleum floor that I washed with straight bleach. The kitchen was the size of a closet and I didn't have a dining room table so we put a door on top of two sawhorses, threw a tablecloth I got at Goodwill over it and dined by candlelight so no one would notice. I borrowed some chairs from my mom so I could accommodate everyone. Then I had to figure out how to get the meal cooked and on the makeshift table.

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Guest View: Passing Thanksgiving Baton to a New Generation

I still wonder what I was thinking when I baked the bread from scratch. It didn't rise very high and wasn't that good but everyone said it was delicious. No matter how bad ...

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