Thanksgiving on Long Island

I spent Thanksgiving (that second most consumption-oriented of American holidays, and thus not exactly my favorite thing) on Long Island (still a least favorite place, all suburbs and sprawl and snarled highways).

Thanksgiving on Long Island, yet I couldn't imagine a better weekend, because I spent it with the family: parents, and aunt and uncle and all three of their kids, plus my cousin's adorable almost-two-year-old baby, who was rightly the center of attention.

On the way back to Ithaca, we visited old family friends, and cousins from the other side of the family, one of whom is also going to have a baby, so all feels more or less right in my world. Especially when I think of friends back in Berlin who can't go home to see their own families, because their countries have erupted into violence and war.

Hokey as it sounds, this Thanksgiving I am grateful for family.

(Insert here pun using my dad's new invented word, "gratitouille" – originally created out of Thanksgiving-oriented "gratitude" and the butternut squash "ratatouille" our friends served us... but perhaps the word could be pressed into new service to describe "gratitude for a mixture of things"?)