Tag Archives: Thanksgiving

Thanks, Away From Home

27 Tuesday Nov 2018

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Thank You — paying it forward, March 3, 2017. (Catlane/iStock; http://digital.vpr.net/)

Yet another Thanksgiving has come and gone. The holiday is problematic for so many reasons, between the erasure, cultural exploitation, and dehumanizing mythology of indigenous Americans and the climate-change-defying national pig-out that begins every late-November Thursday, and continues for weeks afterward, year after year. But the fact that the days off around Thanksgiving gives us worker bees time to spend with family, friends, and those we seriously like and love can’t be ignored.

Sure. At least for those of us who have such people in our lives with whom to share our time off from work, school, and life’s constant treadmill. My American University students reminded me of the allegedly normal ritual of returning home to eat and spend time with family, et al., this past week. Half of them contacted me to let me know they weren’t going to attend the two classes immediately before Thanksgiving, even after learning I wasn’t granting them an excused absence for the holiday week. All so that they could have a few extra days away from the stresses of higher education and the classroom. I envied them, just an iota, if only because they presumably had good reason to spend time with their families and loved ones. I also figured that not everyone in my class was going home to a welcoming environment, or really, going home at all.

“And this time, we didn’t forget the gravy” Looney Tunes “Chow Hound” episode of bullying, greed, and gluttony, originally aired June 16, 1951. (WB; http://tralfaz.blogspot.com/).

That last one was certainly the case for me during my student days. Growing up the way we grew up, in Mount Vernon, at 616, a good Thanksgiving was one where we had a regular meal to eat. Even before the Hebrew-Israelite years of 1981-84, our Thanksgivings weren’t seven-course eat-a-thons. We were lucky if my Uncle Sam came over to eat with us (which after 1978, was pretty rare), and we didn’t spend time around my Mom’s friends once we dived into being Black Jews and fell into grinding welfare poverty.

After I went off to the University of Pittsburgh in August 1987, I only came home to Mount Vernon and 616 one time for Thanksgiving, three months later. My Mom made the biggest Thanksgiving meal I’d seen her make since 1975. I remember mostly the mashed potatoes and gravy. But it wasn’t a family affair, not really. I was home mostly because I had grown used to the well-worn grooves of poverty, abuse, and adult-level responsibilities that had been my life since the fall of 1982. The food, while the first home-cooked meal I’d eaten in three months, was an escape from my normal attempts at escape.

Twelve months later, after six weeks of depression, getting over my Phyllis obsession, a semester of graduate school-like concentration, a summer of unemployment, a week of homelessness, and three months of financial woes and malnourishment, Thanksgiving 1988 had arrived. Between Ron Slater, Beverly, and finally having enough money to not worry about eating or bills for the first time in almost a year, it felt weird, only having gratitude as my companion for a few years.

But life got even weirder for me, as my friend Melissa had invited me to her father’s house for Thanksgiving. This was not a date of any kind, certainly not from my perspective. I think that Melissa sensed how rough my year had been, knew that I wasn’t going home to New York to see family, and did the Christian thing of looking after one’s neighbors. This even though things weren’t exactly great for her and her father at the time. Melissa’s father was an ailing contractor in his early sixties. I really don’t remember much about that Thanksgiving in terms of the food. I think there may have been dinner rolls or candied yams. What I do remember is the two-and-a-half hours I talked with Melissa and her father, about politics, the “Stillers,” Christianity, and Pitt. It was the most thankful holiday I’d ever experienced, and my first Thanksgiving seeing what Thanksgiving was like for family members who enjoyed each other’s company.

It was the first of seven straight Thanksgivings either spent with friends like Melissa, Howard, Kenny, the Gants and their families, or by myself. The “by myself” Thanksgiving was in 1990. It was a cold and rainy day, where I did nothing but watch football, made myself two double cheeseburgers, and found a nearly usable director’s chair outside a vintage furniture gallery in East Liberty. Even then, folks looked out for me. The next day, two of my older Swahili classmates swung by my apartment to bring me Thanksgiving leftovers. They brought me cornbread, dinner rolls, ham, turkey, mashed potatoes, dressing and stuffing, greens, and candied yams with marshmallows. I had tried to say no, but neither of the women would let me. It was really hard for me not to cry while being thankful for such generosity.

It seems like it’s been a lifetime since those naive and cynical days, where I didn’t trust anyone in my life. The bout with homelessness and the financial straits that followed changed my life in ways that I notice even today. Even with the years of working long hours and fighting for my career as a writer and an educator, I realize that I wouldn’t be here doing any of what I’m able to do today without the kindness of strangers and friends, the ability to weigh, sift, and analyze myself and my past or the sense that God had a purpose for me, a reason for living and being. Even after 30 years, I have this and so much else to be thankful for.

A Story of My Life

24 Thursday Nov 2016

Posted by in 1, Academia, Boy @ The Window, Carnegie Mellon University, Christianity, culture, Eclectic, Pittsburgh, Politics, Pop Culture, race, Religion, University of Pittsburgh, Work, Youth

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One of dozen of rags-to-riches falsehoods from Gilded Age author Horatio Nelson (1832-1899). (http://www.pavillionpress.com).

One of dozen of rags-to-riches falsehoods from Gilded Age author Horatio Nelson (1832-1899). (http://www.pavillionpress.com).

That one of the not-so-small miracles of my young adult life from ’88 and me completing my dissertation process in ’96 are just a day apart on the November calendar every year is a story unto itself. Between a month before my nineteen birthday and a month before my twenty-seventh, I went from a semester of homelessness, lack of money for food and rent and living in a firetrap to finishing up a doctorate in history. If this were someone else’s story, I’d think that amazing, even almost unbelievable. At the time, I was so worn out and beat up by Joe Trotter, my dissertation committee, and the scars accumulated over that eight-year — really, twenty-year — period, that the idea of seeing myself as an American example of a Horatio Nelson story would’ve likely made me angry enough to spit blood.

Even now, I don’t and won’t see myself as exceptional. That’s that American bullshit about rags-to-riches stories, about being-a-credit-to-my-race tropes, that I’d be subscribing to here. What I really was back then was young and hungry. So young that I was willing to put up with all kinds of people’s baggage, taking near-minimum wage jobs, allowing people to call me out of my name, excusing racist comments and actions. All because I wanted the brass ring, for myself and for my family. I was already hungry, from years in poverty, from years without friendship bonds, from years of people not recognizing my, dare I say, brilliance. I had a chip on my shoulder, but it wasn’t because I was mad. I was after a righteous reckoning.

Two decades removed from those Carnegie Mellon days, and approaching thirty years since Ron Slater and my band of new friends kept me in money and food during Thanksgiving ’88 and beyond, and I am thankful. I am thankful that I am no longer either of those versions of myself. The one too afraid to ask for help, and the one too naive to realize that the America I believed in for so long never existed. I am thankful that I know more about asking for and providing help, about understanding that in this America, help might never arrive, at least when folks most need it. I am thankful mostly that I still have optimism, I still have drive, and I still have people who like and love me enough to remind me that a few of America’s giga-pixels are worth savoring.

On Becoming A Father — 11 Years Later

16 Monday Dec 2013

Posted by in 1, Boy @ The Window, Carnegie Mellon University, culture, Eclectic, Jimme, Marriage, Mount Vernon New York, My Father, New York City, Pittsburgh, Pop Culture, University of Pittsburgh, Youth

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Wife and son, August 16, 2003. (Donald Earl Collins).

Wife and son, latter at two weeks and change old, August 16, 2003. (Donald Earl Collins).

This week eleven years ago is when I first learned from my wife that she was pregnant with our one and only child, our son Noah. It was a high that took a few months of post-natal sleep deprivation to come down from, not to mention a fight to keep my job and move on from it courtesy of AED in ’03 and early ’04. But learning that I was soon to become a father didn’t just bring joy and euphoria. It came with baggage and the fear that my baggage would be a handicap to me as a father and to my gestating son.

Luckily I had a bit of time to prepare for becoming a father. I figured out that my wife was pregnant a few weeks before she did. It was on Thanksgiving Day ’02, and I was whisking a cream sauce to go with some chocolate torte dessert I was making. I asked my wife to watch over the cream and to make sure that it didn’t boil over when I went to the bathroom. Sure enough, the sauce was boiling over when I came back. I said sarcastically, “Thanks for messing up the cream!,” which led to my wife going to the bathroom, crying. You have to understand, my wife rarely cries, and never cries over my brand of New York-esque sarcasm. So when she said, “I’m sorry,” I said, “It’s okay, honey,” followed by, “Why are you literally crying over boiling cream? Are you sure you’re not pregnant?”

From that moment until my wife had given herself an EPT test three weeks later, I’d already started the process of psychological preparation. We’d barely begun trying to have a kid. We talked about it in July ’02, changed our diets in August and September, and I started taking herbal supplements by the end of September. Two months of actual trying in total. Really? That’s all it took?

All I knew was that fatherhood would bring back so many memories, some good, most of them bad and ugly. About my father Jimme and his alcoholism and homophobia as directed at me, my ex-stepfather’s physical and psychological abuse, about having to serve in my father-like role with my younger siblings and with Darren. By the time I’d reached grad student, some eleven years earlier, I wasn’t sure if I’d ever fall in love or get married, much less become a father. I mean, who would want to be with me, have little Donalds and Donnas running around that had about half of my features and traits? I wasn’t sure if I’d ever want that.

Fast-forward through grad school at Pitt and Carnegie Mellon, through four and half years of dating and two years of marriage. I was in a different place, not much different, but different enough to be much more sure about what I wanted. As I said to my wife, “There are four days out of the week where I’m sure about having a kid, two where I don’t want a child, and one where I simply don’t know.”

That was still good enough for my wife. And she’s the reason I could be firmly committed to fatherhood. I don’t think that I would’ve become a father otherwise. Have I made mistakes over the past ten years and five months with Noah? Of course! I once left him in a carrier on our table when he was five months over, and it flipped over end-over-end, scaring the crap out of him (literally!). I’ve yelled at him when I shouldn’t have, and I’ve cursed out at least one hundred too many bad DC area drivers with him in the back seat of our Honda Element over the years.

But despite all of the ups and downs in my life, career(s) and even marriage, one of the handful of things I’m sure about is having become a father to my son a good eight and a half months before he was born. I still check on him nearly every night to watch him sleep (and breath).

Who I Was Thankful For In ’88 — Ron Slater

28 Thursday Nov 2013

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From September 6, ’88 through the beginning of Thanksgiving week twelve weeks later, I had a grand total of $335 to work with. That included money for food, rent and washing clothes. It included the $75 I made over three weeks and six sessions with Sera-Tec donating plasma. It wasn’t the first time I’d tortured dollars into submission, and it’s hardly been the last. But it was the first time in my life I reached out for help beyond myself and family.

From Boy @ The Window:

Despite these acts of generosity and my acts of desperation, I knew that I’d probably starve before the semester was over. I had less than ten dollars to work with after the first week in November. I went to Thackeray Hall to register for classes for next semester. While there, it occurred to me to go upstairs to see one of the financial aid counselors, an older Black woman named Beverly who’d been really nice to me while working through my bill issues earlier in the semester. I told her in detail what was going on. “You need to talk to Ron,” she said, referring to Ron Slater, the university ombudsman, the person who normally resided over tuition payment issues. So there I was the next day, explaining to the ombudsman my situation.

“We’ll take care of this, we’ll find you some extra money. Just hang in there for a few days,” he said. Slater actually offered me money right out of his wallet.

“No thanks, I’ll be all right,” I said, my voice starting to crack because I was so grateful that anyone cared enough to help me through my dire straits. I somehow found a way not to cry right there on the spot.

Hypodermic needles used for donating blood or plasma (note the gauge or thickness), November 28, 2013. (http://dmplgrl.blogspot.com).

Hypodermic needles used for donating blood or plasma (note the gauge or thickness), November 28, 2013. (http://dmplgrl.blogspot.com).

The week before Thanksgiving, I went to check in with Beverly. “I’ve got good news for you, but you’ll have to wait a few days.” Through the ombudsman, the university had recalculated my financial aid package, increasing my Pell to the maximum amount allowed, and added the federal SEOG grant (Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants) to my aid menu. Both gave me an extra $800 to work with. After that weekend, one where Regis’ potatoes became a part of my diet, I bummed five dollars off of one of my classmates from General Writing. The next day I got my check from the ombudsman. “I’m so glad to have been of help. It’s part of my job. I just wish you’d come to me earlier,” Slater said. Hearing that did make me tear up. I was in the spirit of the season already. It was two days before Thanksgiving. I spent that holiday at Melissa’s house with her and her father, an ailing contractor in his early-sixties.

Slater’s wasn’t the only act of generosity I was thankful for that semester. Between my friends Regis and Marc and Melissa, I didn’t starve in those last couple of weeks before Thanksgiving. But Slater’s job, his work had made it so that I could graduate, not just eat peanut butter crackers, horrible tuna sandwiches and pork neck bones and rice into that December.That was a quarter-century ago.

Fast-forward nine years. My then girlfriend and now wife also ended up seeking help from Slater, as she could not finish her degree because she owed several thousand dollars to Pitt in tuition. I encouraged her to write and meet with Slater. He deferred her tuition payments for the upcoming spring semester so that she could graduate in April ’98.

It’s not every day that I get to thank someone for not only helping me, but others in my life as well. I don’t know where Ron Slater is now, but I am truly, truly thankful that our paths crossed in the fall of ’88.

Thanksgiving Family Drama

23 Friday Nov 2012

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German Chocolate Cake, Thanksgiving Dessert, November 22, 2012. (Donald Earl Collins).

Thanksgiving Day ’12 will go down as the year I finally managed to balance quality and volume for me and my small family of wife and finicky nine-year-old son. I did nearly all of the cooking on Wednesday, starting with the turkey and stuffing at 7:30 am, and ending with mushroom gravy at 11:45 pm. In between, I dropped my son off for school, ran some errands, finished the turkey and stuffing, went for a 5.4-mile run, made the mac and cheese — as well as steak and butternut squash soup (from scratch) for dunch — and finally showered.

Then I made the collard/turnip greens mixture, seasoned ham with brown sugar and butter, super sugary Kool-Aid (first time I’ve made it in two years), iced tea with lemon and German chocolate cake in quick succession. In between, I also made dinner for my son, sorted and wrapped fifteen pounds of meat for the freezer, and did another round of grading for one of my classes. All in all, a very busy day, but it made the mashed potatoes and setting the table yesterday look like nothing by comparison.

Most of my Thanksgivings as an adult have been pretty peaceful. I’ve actually only been back to Mount Vernon for three — count them, three — Thanksgivings since I left for college and Pittsburgh in ’87. One was in ’87, then after the 616 fire in ’95 (see my post “The Fire This Time” from April ’08), and then with me and my family in ’06. At these gatherings, folks were too busy eating to get into serious issues like acne problems of whether someone’s cake was made from scratch or not.

But at my wife’s family’s Thanksgiving gatherings — which I attended or served as sous chef from ’96-’99 and in ’01 — the above issues and more became part of the annual Turkey Day in Pittsburgh. The most elaborate and long-winded of such dinners in Homewood-Brushton was in ’01. It was going to be a doozy right from the start, as I’d agreed to cook virtually all of the Thanksgiving dinner for an estimated twenty-five guests (it turned out to be twenty-eight in all). Me and my wife flew in from DC that Tuesday and wasted no time in buying everything we’d need to make her family’s version of a Thanksgiving meal possible.

Wife’s family and Noah in Pittsburgh, July 15, 2004. (Donald Earl Collins).

My sister-in-law flew in from San Diego the following day, and wasn’t exactly to see us. Or at least, was standoff-ish with me. It was only the third time we’d ever met, and the first time me and my wife had seen her since ’96 (and since we’d married in April ’00). She wasn’t happy having to share her sister with me, among the other issues she had back then.

She found fault with me making a chocolate cake via Duncan Hines instead of completely from scratch, even though I’d also made a twenty-two pound turkey, corn bread, five pounds of collard and turnip greens, five pounds of potatoes, a gallon’s worth of turkey mushroom gravy and stuffing with sausage that Wednesday. It was one of a series of not-so-charming comments from her that week.

Thanksgiving Day wasn’t much better, for us, for my sister-in-law, or for my wife’s extended family. Just after 12:30 pm, “G,” one of my wife’s cousin-in-laws, showed up with his two teenage kids, four hours before we had scheduled ourselves to serve dinner. He reminded me of my now late ex-stepfather, loud, out-of-shape, and ready to eat or fight at a moment’s notice. Between him and my brooding sister-in-law, I was happy to be in a hot kitchen or down in the basement getting furniture while finishing the preparations for dinner.

The dinner itself was a hit, as in-laws, cousins, nieces and nephews went for seconds and thirds between 4:45 and 6:30-ish. Then G suddenly became really loud and obviously angry while watching the Dallas game in the crowded living room. One of his kids had said as a joke to the then forty-nine year-old, “You’re so old, you were born before they built the railroads!” You know, stuff anyone over thirty hears from their kids at least once a week. But for nearly an hour and a half, G smouldered, then yelled, then smouldered some more, as cousins and in-laws tried to step in. He disowned his kids right in front of at least a dozen family members.

The crescendo was between G and his nephew “AA,” the third family member who had attempted to end the situation. AA was telling G to go home, and even offered to take him there. The rest is family strife gold and history.

“Don’t you EVER come to my house!,” G yelled.

“I love you, and…” AA responded.

“If you come to MY house, I’m gonna put you in a body bag!,” G hollered with a death stare.

“Then I’m gonna be in the back of your mind for the rest of your life!,” AA yelled, a bit hurt.

Eat’n Park logo, March 2011. (http://www.printablecoupons.us/).

While that was going on, my sister-in-law suddenly complained to the female contingent at the dining room table, “They never pick up the phone! They screen all of their calls!” That was in reference to me and my wife.

By 9 pm, it was all over, with two disowned kids, a crazy middle-aged man and a gloomy sister-in-law as part of the package deal that was Thanksgiving ’01. All that was left was an awkward Eat’n Park lunch with my sister-in-law that Friday — not exactly “the place for smiles” that day — and her suddenly booking an early return ticket for San Diego for Saturday morning. We had paid for her original round-trip flight, and her new flight cost more than the original ticket. She really wanted to get away!

So despite how tired I’ve been since Thanksgiving morning, I’ll take the peace of mind that comes with a small family and a thankful gathering any day over Thanksgiving ’01 and family drama.