Tradition

David called Ray yesterday - he was thinking about us too. For years since we lived closer to him we had spent every Thanksgiving in NJ. The day before we would hop in the car and make the trek to Kearney to visit, we were there so often we had a favorite hotel, restaurant, store. We went to the bar on the corner once, it was all the local men and it took me a few minutes to realize I was the only woman in the place. I had to laugh when the bartender came down to assure me she had spoken to the bar and no one was allowed to swear - I told her that was REALLY not necessary as I could probably out swear anyone in the bar. We ate Thanksgiving dinner almost exclusively at The Stack because they did a really stellar job of it. The staff knew us and knew Ray better, only once did we go somewhere else and we laughed about that for years. Our waiter was an alcoholic and had the shakes, getting our meals was a precarious thing as he jittered them down to us! He actually sat down at our table a few times next to Ray when he got too wobbly - we did tip well, you cannot pay enough for such a wonderful memory. After that we would spend a couple of days, we went to museums, restaurants, the bookstore was always popular. But Ray is no longer able to get out and we are too far in any case. 

For the past couple of years David and I have spent Thanksgiving on our own, it was not a sad thing. A lot of restaurants are open for the holiday so it was fun picking a new and different place to go. And now, we are here. Near family and friends - it's a whole new universe. We had Thanksgiving early on Whidbey Island as Jackson was shipping out - but over the years we've  found it's the celebration, not the date that's important - it was wonderful after all these years to be be able to drive to our destination and not have to spend a day recuperating from the trip and adjusting to the new time zone. And we got to keep celebrating! - last night we had Thanksgiving with Kim and Steve, her daughter Celia and son in law Gabe. We have not seen Celia in years so it was wonderful to see what an amazing young woman she's become.  And dinner - Kim could out cook Ramsey with her eyes shut, she made enough for about 30 people, on and on it went but so much fun. They have a fleet of tiny dogs bouncing around, we had a great time. I'm so glad we moved here and now we need to start getting ready for Christmas.