The Gravitational Pull of Turkey Gravy is Measured by the Number of Necks in the Roaster

I live in a three-storied House of Aroma, and I say this in the nicest possible way.

Close-approximation living is a learned behavior and is not for the overly sensitive.

The House of Aroma has, as I say, three floors. Curries float up from the first floor astride a conspiratorial acoustic guitar; spaghetti and color-crusted oil paintings with chips on their shoulders waft down from the attic. On my floor? This week it’s boxed pizzas and the faint electric smell of sparking brain synapses.

And therein lies the beauty: Each place has its personality, its own energy. Maybe it’s the direction the house faces, where the windows are, that attracts people to the city.

I don’t know what it is and I don’t care but it’s Saturday evening and I smell turkey, people!

Turkey!

Turkey! Beckoning arms of buttery goodness. Who can be sad when there’s turkey? I’ve been swept away by a river of turkey gravy, and I can’t stop thinking about it.

It is as if part of my mind has been seized, seized with vivid, visual memories of Thanksgiving tables, tablecloths and mismatched folding chairs and cousins, women with dishcloths and men with cigarettes.

And the other part of my mind? The other part of my mind is puttering around the house setting things aright only to find itself considering the complexity of canned cranberry jelly versus the whole-berry-style cranberry sauce. Why, the vintage appeal alone of the canned jelly, the way it retains the shape of the can? What could possibly be more kitsch than cranberry jelly? And so perfect for spreading on sandwiches later, too! That’s not to say that there’s not room for change, for some attention to the true taste of the untamed cranberry itself...

Ah. Did you hear that? This is what it has come to. My mind has been turned on end, and all by the heady bouquet of roasting turkey.

I give up. That's right. I’m just going to sit here, my feet up and my eyes closed, and think about plump golden goodness and tables of people happy in knowing that they’ll soon be eating with people they really like, and that later, there will be pie.

And that reminds me: Happy Mother’s Day, Mom. You’re the lilac-scented air on a warm day, and the turkey-dinnered meals of my life.