When women support each other, incredible things happen.
~Cher
How hard can it be to cook a turkey? After all, I watched my grandma and mom cook them for as long as I can remember. They would place the turkey in the roaster and pop it in the oven. And, just like that, every year a perfectly golden-brown, roasted bird graced our Thanksgiving table. I never paid much attention to the process. My focus was only on the feast.
I remember the year that things would be different. Although my dear grandma had been gone for several years, this was the first holiday when my mom would be gone, too. She had passed away on November 19, 1997, at the age of 74. Her funeral took place just six days before Thanksgiving.
Facing that first Thanksgiving without my grandma or mom, I quickly realized that not only had I suddenly become the matriarch of our family, but I was next in line to reign over the Thanksgiving dinner. This was a bequest I did not want. I felt sad and nervous. After all, I had never cooked a turkey.
It had been a few harrowing weeks of anticipating the death of my mom, so planning for this feast was a diversion that I sorely needed. It had been difficult to accept that her death was inevitable but more difficult watching her suffer. I was determined to fix a nice holiday dinner for my husband and our two teenagers. They had been close to their Grandma Ruth and missed her, so I wanted to make this Thanksgiving special for them, to ease their grief at least for a bit.
I headed to our neighborhood Kroger where I spotted an ad for turkeys at thirty percent off. I felt like this was a good start. It was in the early morning hours of a beautiful November day. The sun was bright. The usual Midwest gloominess was replaced by a sapphire-blue sky and crisp, cold temperatures. Large, lacey snowflakes glistened in the sun.
The energy that morning in Kroger was contagious. Holiday music was playing softly overhead, and fall decorations seemed to take over the store. Gourds and pumpkins, flower-filled cornucopias, tins of decorated cookies, and bags of candy corn were on display everywhere.
The grocery store was packed with wall-to-wall shoppers, mostly women, pushing carts brimming with all the holiday fixings. The atmosphere was festive, and I was trying my best to enjoy this bittersweet experience. So far, so good, until I got to the turkey aisle.
Staring down into the bin of frozen birds, I could feel my emotions bubbling up inside me. I started to panic. So many different sizes, so many different brands, so many different emotions, so many different memories.
The tears started flowing, slowly at first, until the sobbing took over. The lady next to me looked worried and asked kindly, “Are you okay?”
I felt myself starting to have a meltdown right there in the frozen-turkey aisle of Kroger.
I whispered through my sobs, “No, I am not okay. My mom just died, and she always cooked the turkey.”
I was now fully engulfed in the ugly-cry. As my shoulders started to shake and the sobs gained momentum, a fellow customer hugged me when she overheard me say, “I never cooked a turkey.”
By now, I was causing quite a stir. Several women were alerted by my sobs. They lovingly surrounded me, grabbing tissues from their purses. I could hear faint whispers, “Poor thing just lost her mom… funeral was days ago… never cooked a turkey.”
I also heard louder voices giving well-intended advice, “Use a cooking bag, rub the turkey with oil, stuff the turkey, don’t stuff the turkey, find the bag of gizzards inside the cavity, throw it away, cook it for the dressing.”
The whispers of compassion and the voices of guidance spoken by the unlikely support group of women in the frozen-turkey aisle in Kroger that day was, to me, the language of love.
“You’ll be okay… You can do it… I’m here for you if you need help… Your mom would be proud.”
These compassionate ladies were there for me, just when I needed them. They lined up to embrace me. Some gave me telephone numbers on slips of paper to call for help if needed.
Some shared stories of their own mother’s passing, while others, with tears in their eyes, admitted they were also having a hard time facing the holidays.
These sympathetic strangers gave me comfort and confidence that I would somehow make it through this first Thanksgiving without my mom.
As I walked out of Kroger that morning, frozen turkey in hand, I heard someone shout, “Have a happy Thanksgiving!” I smiled, thinking about our family tradition of sharing what each of us is thankful for.
This year, I knew I would share that I was thankful for the loving ladies I met in the frozen-turkey aisle of Kroger.
— Karen Kipfer Smith —
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