Seasons and seasoning.
Women’s Week in Ptown I dressed up as a “Craven” yes half crow half raven. I don’t know why but some folks thought I was a Turkey getting ready for the Holiday season. I’m so glad I live in Rhode Island and I get to experience the seasons. I love the trees changing colors and the cool crisp air. When I was living in Los Angeles, for fourteen years, I realized their four seasons were…floods, fires, earthquakes and drought.
At first it was hard getting used to living in the quiet woods. I mean I must have gotten used to hearing all the hustle and bustle of Santa Monica Blvd., with four lanes of traffic, buzzing through West Hollywood. So, one day as I was standing in my new yard in RI, looking up at the big sky, suddenly out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of some movement coming toward me and I instinctively jumped and got into my crouching tiger ninja karate chop position, ready to defend myself. I was ashamed to find out, it was merely a leaf falling from the sky. My heart was racing with fear for my life from a falling leaf. City life, country life. Time to calm down.
My family is small now – just me, my brother and my Mom are left. So our Thanksgiving tradition is changing. Mother doesn’t want to cook or clean anymore, so we have a new tradition; we go over to her house, Thanksgiving morning and we have coffee and muffins. Nice but last year I told her, I wanted to cook the meal for Tommy and some friends at my house and she is more than welcome to join us there. And without skipping a beat she laughed and said “Oh Poppy you can’t do that.” I was kinda pissed and said “Why not?”
She proceeded to tell me why not, “You don’t know how to make the gravy, cook the bird, make the stuffing, you don’t know what you are doing.”
“Yes I do.”
“No you can’t do it, it is just to difficult for you to do. Don’t even bother, you can’t do it.”
I stood my ground and said, “ My therapist says I can!” So of course I went ahead and did it. I bought a 20 pound turkey and had four friends over and guess what? I screwed it up. The Turkey was not done in 3 1/2 hours like it was supposed to be. The Popper never popped. It turns out the popper I was watching, was actually a handle you use to pull the Turkey out of the pan. The meat was still pink. I nearly gave everyone Salmonella for Thanksgiving. It took 5 hours. The sides were nearly all cooked away, mashed potatoes became home fries, green beans were crunchy, stuffing was dry and as always I forgot the cranberry sauce. When I told my mother what happened she was truly happy.
I couldn’t do it. But, I did do it –And as a stand up comic I am finally learning to stand up to my mother.