Thanksgiving in Rawdon

For the last twelve years I have lived alone. As a result I usually spend my holidays with friends and family. So, for or the first time this Thanksgiving I hosted a festive meal. I am afraid it might be my last. 

This year I decided to spend Thanksgiving at the Rectory in Rawdon. Knowing that I am not skilled enough to provide anything more complicated than boiled potatoes, it was decided that the Vicar General  would prepare the meal and arrive with a turkey and all the trimmings on Sunday afternoon. 

On Saturday night I threw my back out and was immobilized. I hobbled through Mass and then threw myself on the mercy of my parishioners to help me move tables, prepare bedrooms, and set the table for Thanksgiving dinner. The Vicar General duly arrived with a beautiful rolled turkey breast stuffed with sausage meat, white meat and cranberries, together with gravy, squash, Stilton and other cheeses, fresh bread and other dishes. After placing dinner on the kitchen counter it was requested that we go immediately to the church to see the restoration work on the floor and in the sanctuary. So off we trotted through the glebe land to the church. 

I do not actually live alone. I share the rectory with a particularly soft and daft cat named Speireag and a slightly  overweight German shepherd / Collie named Righ. The dog is not terribly used to company. He is certainly not used to food being around, especially food on the counter. On the rare occasions I do fix a meal and eat there is nothing left out. The vet also put Righ on a diet two months ago so he has been a wee bit down in mouth recently. 

On arriving back from the church we gathered around a strange looking, small, white, fatty slab lying in the middle of the rectory office. It took a few seconds to identify it as the last remaining vestige of the Thanksgiving turkey. The Vicar General grabbed his temples and promptly said he was going for a nap and we would have to deal with getting another turkey. So my friend Nicholas and I headed off for the IGA at about 5pm on Thanksgiving Day. It was only when we arrived at the meat area that we realised that neither of us knew how to cook meat. I have been a vegetarian for years (with gaps mind you) and have never cooked a piece of meat of any kind. Nicholas hadn’t either. So we stood there looking dejected over an almost empty meat freezer. One of the teenagers in my youth group is studying to become a butcher and luckily he happened along. Then a couple of other teenage guys just back from a tracker pull or some such thing arrived. Next thing I know we are being advised by teenagers about the difference between frozen turkeys and precooked turkeys and the various ways of cooking them and other options available for dinner. It was simply humiliating. They seemed to take great glee from the state of events. 

On arriving home with one of the last precooked hams we found yet another odd white slab of something on the office floor. On recognizing it as the remains of the after-dinner Stilton I think we both let out a yell. Nobody had thought to move the rest of the dinner off the counter after the turkey had disappeared. The bread, the gravy, the cheeses and most of the rest of dinner simply vanished.

I think that is when we had our first gin and tonic. The Vicar General did prepare the ham and put in the oven to bake while we awaited the arrival of Fr Bruce Myers (recently ordained to the priesthood in Quebec Cathedral). Fr Bruce somehow ended up in Saint Beatrix or somewhere. To make a long story short he was rather late. When we went to get the ham it was, well, rather blackened. Even a couple of nice bottles of wine did not lift the palpable disappointment of a less than festive meal. After desert pie, the only thing Righ did not consume, (although we did forget the ice cream) everyone retired to bed early. I remained up with the dog waiting for the effects of an entire thanksgiving dinner for four to take hold. He was fine. Actually he looked happier than the last couple of months when he was on his diet. He even snored that night in his sleep.

After a perfectly acceptable brunch two members of the party went for a walk. After an hour the telephone rang and over the crackle and static of a dying cell phone I heard the words, “LOST! Lost in the Woods!” as the phone died. For those of you who have seen the Blair Witch project you get the idea. After the finding of the lost sheep and the cars packed everyone was off. Before leaving the Vicar General looked me straight in the eye and said, “My dear Father, this has certainly been a MEMORABLE Thanksgiving.” I replied, “You mean I will never hear the end of it.” “Exactly”, he said.. Meanwhile Righ was still asleep in front of the study fire, snoring.

Fr Edward Simonton OGS

Priest of the Oratory of the Good Shepherd