When Death is at the Table
Navigating Thanksgiving during a season of unprecedented loss
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. It’s like Christmas but without the obligation of pretending to like the gifts you’re being given.
Don’t take that as a statement of non-gratitude. It’s just that I’m not a things person. I’m an experiences person. And Thanksgiving is an experience.
My grandmother died this year. A few weeks ago. Not from COVID. Cancer. She was diagnosed at the start of our state’s lockdown which means she did her rounds and rounds of chemo alone in a hospital room.
When I hugged her goodbye on Christmas Eve last year, how could I have known I wouldn’t hug her again until October a year later? No longer responding to treatment, the family said fuck it and took off our masks. We hugged. Held hands. Prayed. And cried.
And said goodbye.
Sitting around the prayer circle with her pastor planning the funeral service, we all took turns sharing stories about her. Her kindness. Her persistence. Her faith. Her cooking.
Coconut cake. Lima beans. Sausage balls. Yeast rolls. Sweet potato casserole. Stuffing — two kinds, one with onions and one without.
“You know, she started cooking Thanksgiving dinner weeks ahead of time? Come Halloween she was already cooking.”
We all looked around as the date sank in. October 29th. We were already behind.
I guess I should tell you that she was actually my step-grandmother, Glenda. My biological grandmothers both passed before I was in kindergarten and Glenda came into my life not long after. Two-thirds of my Thanksgivings have been spent around her table.
While she was much closer to her biological grandchildren, for me, her holidays were my safe haven. A little island of a traditional family in a sea of divorced-and-remarried parent chaos that you eventually learn to live with but doesn’t quite go away.
I’m going to miss that tradition. The comfort that comes from knowing there’s a day in November where we’ll pause, walk through that door into a house full of rich smells and warm food and big hugs, and put the world aside for a minute. Inhale. Exhale.
This year we debated doing Thanksgiving at all. COVID was part of the conversation but not a big one. Masks and distancing went out the window as we sat vigil at her bedside, planned her funeral, held each other as she was lowered into the ground, and worked together to get her affairs in order. Whatever that means.
No. We talked about not doing it because what would it be without her? It’s too soon. It’s too sacred.
And at the same time, how could we not? I think that table was a safe haven for all of us in many ways. And during this time, a time of utmost uncertainty, there are certain things we cling to.
So my step-mom has taken the reigns. She’s a good woman. She’s gotten us all together to list off our favorite dishes from Glenda and divvied up the work of making it all. Which is a relief — she’s not much of a cook herself. And we only started planning last week.
She’s on coconut cake from a box and honey baked ham from the store. I’ve got pumpkin pie and wine. We’ll tackle deviled eggs and broccoli salad together. We’re going to shake things up and have the guys fry a turkey for the first time this year. Secretly, that’s because no one really knows how to bake a turkey the traditional way.
And the guys want an excuse to avoid the kitchen as the three adult women attempt to create a meal one force of nature had been fixing for us for fifty years.
Whatever Thanksgiving looks like this year, my prayer is for us all to be present. Here. Now. In the room with ourselves and anyone we’re lucky enough to hold space with. One day we will be on the other side of this. We will look back. And my hope is we see so many things to be thankful for.
