THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, November 22, 1994 TAG: 9411220052
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: My Family
SOURCE: BY ELIZABETH THIEL, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 68 lines
I FINALLY had to tell my parents a couple weekends ago that I wouldn't be spending Thanksgiving with them this year.
My mom's eyes teared up, the way I knew they would. That look was why I procrastinated.
She wasn't sad because she'll miss my smiling face next to her at the table. Instead she felt, as did I, the sudden rush of a rite of passage we had managed to avoid for years.
I missed Thanksgiving with my folks last year, too. But that was to go on a ski trip with a group of friends. This year it's different, more important. I'm spending the holiday with my boyfriend's mother and brothers.
It's the beginning of a lifetime of splitting holidays between my real family and an adopted one. It's what adults do.
My mom's not sure she's ready, and neither am I.
Time was when I'd probably have rejoiced at a break from the smothering onslaught of my huge family - four uncles, three aunts, 12 first cousins my age or younger and a grandmother whose poor hearing requires everyone to shout.
We'd all pile into an uncle's Williamsburg home, the only one really big enough for all of us. We call the place Tara.
When we were younger, the routine was that we'd be herded by harried adults down to the basement playroom, where we'd horse around for hours. My cousin, Katy, a month older but about two years bigger than me, would alternately bully me and side with me to bully the younger kids. In between all that tense rivalry, we'd get some serious playing done.
Our favorite games were fun house and television show. Fun house consisted of turning out the lights and forcing the other kids to dip their hands into various gooey concoctions, like toilet paper soaked in water (monster guts), or olives floating in vegetable oil (eyeballs).
We usually always chose the nighttime television soap ``Dallas'' to mimic. I got to play Sue Ellen, the breathy, slightly neurotic wife of the illustrious J.R. Ewing. I liked that role because it meant I got to wear an old fake fur coat of my aunt's.
When dinnertime came, we'd be seated at the kitchen table, one safe room away from the adults. We'd usually end up having a small food fight, or at least threatening one.
As we grew older, those rosy pursuits faded somewhat, at least for the older cousins. Gradually, we were allowed to join the adults at the dining room table.
That was a mixed blessing. It meant we were old enough to clean the dishes after dinner, too.
And it meant we had to listen to the escalating political arguments of our uncles that usually started in front of a televised football game before dinner and ended in a shouting match after dessert. It's a strange ritual, considering that my father and my uncles are from the same ideological orientation - quite right of Reagan.
Somehow I usually lost my appetite by the time the pumpkin pie is served, around the same time that all the world's problems have been blamed upon liberal Democrats.
I used to sit around that table and wonder when I could have a Thanksgiving to just enjoy my turkey soaked in giblet gravy, and the only point of controversy arising from which dish tasted better.
I wonder if this will be that Thanksgiving. I wonder if it's really what I wanted after all. by CNB