Happy Quinoa Risotto Day

When we sent out the invitations for vegan Thanksgiving our friend Tim said, “Thanks so much! I’ll bring the turkey!”

In the spirit of live and let live (except for the bird) we said that would be great.  And it was.  Tim brought a huge turkey along with pig sausage stuffing and gravy.

Mike made a quinoa risotto, two mushroom pies, and a huge sweet potato stew, plus we had a bunch of veggie sides: roast potatoes, mashed potatoes, Brussels sprouts and homemade sourdough bread our friend baked for us that morning. 

Everyone brought a vegan dessert, each one so tasty it could not go untasted.  There was a sugar high, a sugar crash, and then we bid farewell to our guests and their kids in various stages of meltdown.  

I fell asleep fifteen minutes after the last guest departed, maybe sooner.

It all was very festive and warm and abundant.

And then the next day I woke up, turned to Mike, and said, “Babe, that was really fantastic.”

And he said, “but ..?”

“Well, but, I had a lot of anxiety leading up to it and I didn’t even sleep the night before because I was so nervous about the seating arrangements and I’m so exhausted and I just don’t know maybe next year we should go to Big Sur or get Indian take-out or just make one stir-fry or something?”

And Mike sighed, breathing in deeply like he’d been hit after shopping and cooking and cleaning and hosting his heart out for days to make a lovely Thanksgiving for our family and friends.  And then he exhaled and I said, “Or we can just keep hosting if it’s really important to you I was just thinking it’s a lot and Ax and I don’t get you so much and so maybe if we have this time together doing this whole thing isn’t the Best Way to spend that time and I’m sorry I really did think the quinoa turned out great this year and just forget it.”

And Mike said, “But the stew sucked.”

“I didn’t say that.  The sweet potato stew was very good.  It was very good.”

“No, it was terrible.  Did you see how much of that sausage stuffing Tim made?  That was a ton of food and it practically all got eaten.”

“People like sausage,” I said.

“Yeah they do,” he said.

“I like you,” I said.

“But the stew sucked.”

“It did.  But you are wonderful and I appreciate you.”

“I love you.”

“I’m grateful for you.”

“I’m sorry the holidays are stressful for you.”

“Thank you, honey.”

I’m gonna keep going.