FROM SOUP TO NUTS: Family Is Forever

Today, I had intended to release the recipe for my husband’s homemade pumpkin pie. 

 (Actually, it’s not originally Jerry’s recipe.  Many years ago, listening to WJR Radio, he heard the chef from Greenfields Restaurant in Detroit discuss Thanksgiving desserts, and he copied the recipe and made it his specialty.  Since Greenfields burned to the ground many years ago, I guess now Jerry is the “keeper of the secret recipe.”)

 However, we’ve moved since I last read the “secret recipe”; and today, I couldn’t find it in the jumble of old clippings and recipe cards.  So with Jerry’s secret safe for another year, I turn to something even better than pie:  Family Foibles!

 On a weekend like this, gathering with family members from near and far, I can’t help but chuckle (well, chuckle politely, on the inside, lest anyone feel offended). “How different we are from one another!” I ponder.  One is the “class clown” who interrupts every conversation with a joke.  Another is the organizer, lining up volunteers for dish duty, pushing to get everyone seated for games.  One is a news junky who always knows what’s going on—while another is the ingénue, marveling at month-old headlines which she’s hearing for the first time. 

Picky eaters and gourmands, fashionistas and casual dressers, raucously exuberant and quietly reflective, we come together and our differences are smashed to smithereens by love.  We are family, we belong together, and all is good.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!