Shared Effort

We tried doing a holiday without being too "holiday."

It was just the two of us (my younger son and me) for Thanksgiving, so instead of cooking at home, we went to the movies, and then joined a full crowd of my co-workers on campus. We went for a walk in the woods. I showed my son the intricacies of the phenomenally gorgeous location in the redwoods where I work. His jaw dropped. "Mom, this place is stupid beautiful."

The meal was great. The turkey and stuffing were better than anything I could ever make, and there was no stress. No guests in my home, no trying to cram multiple people into my tiny kitchen, no debate over what to listen to or watch.

And ... there was something missing.

We both felt it.

As I got ready for bed, I stopped back in the kitchen.

"It was a great Thanksgiving," I said to my son. "But maybe next year we cook something, even if it's just us?"

My son nodded. "Yeah, it'll be me cooking, but that's okay. Let's do that next year."

Honestly, nobody's ever going to remember my cooking. I have neither a skill in it nor the desire to improve. I make meals we can eat, but lack of burning is not the same as craft.

My baking skills peaked in the 6th grade with chocolate chip cookies, and I'm okay with that, too. My family is okay with that. They regard my lack of domestic skills as just a weird facet of my personality, as if something had to give, that it was better the cooking instead of the writing. They understand the importance of the writing, to me and other people.

My children long ago accepted living with a mom who disappears into her head regularly and emerges with thoughts beautifully written but little memory of how any of it happened. It's like living with a very pleasant intellectual amnesiac, I suppose. The notebooks and the blogposts and the books just keep piling up.

But one thing I know is the human heart and understanding how to listen when it whispers.

The heart whispered last night. My son and I both heard it.

We'll be in that kitchen next year, bumping into each other. I'll try not to mess up too many dishes. He'll remind me that the burner doesn't work unless you remember to turn it on.

It won't be like the huge, glorious Thanksgivings I remember as a kid – with 30 people in the house and that crisp, cold November New England air when you stepped out the back door just to get a breath but you went back inside quick because Mom needed help putting a dish on the table – but that's okay. It doesn't have to be like that.

Shared effort is what we're after.

It's the basis of community, and it seems we're both addicted to it a bit more than relaxation. And that's okay. Identifying what you need is always a good step.