The Perfect Thanksgiving

One of the many steps I took to “control” my eating was to join Overeater’s Anonymous. In 1990, the level of shame and sadness I felt about the condition of my body, as well as the relationship I had with food, drove me to the level of desperation it takes to walk into a 12-Step room.

After a few months of meetings and securing a sponsor, I began to feel like I wasn’t so alone and decided to invite six of the friends I’d made in the rooms over to my tiny one-bedroom railroad apartment in Jersey City for Thanksgiving.

As the host, I offered to cook the turkey. Growing up, it was a family tradition to name the bird. As a kid, we always called it Harry, but I now lived in a very Latino neighborhood and in honor of that, I named my first Butterball Pepe.

I was so proud of myself as I scattered celery, onion and carrot around the pan aluminum pan and slid butter under the skin. After it was in the oven, I called my mother to share the good news. “You remembered to take the pouch out of the cavity?” she asked.

Pouch?

“The one with the giblets and neck bone in it?”

Thanks to my mom, I averted that disaster, then set the table and waited for my guests.

It was enough to have that many people in my small space, but with everyone on a specific eating plan, the obsessive food restrictions were off the charts. Some weren't eating anything white, mainly items made with flour or sugar. Others weren't eating meat. There were even a few who were triggered by dairy products and avoided them. 

Because many of us were new in the program, we didn’t yet realize how we’d traded one compulsion for another. Instead of obsessing about what we ate, we ruminated on what we couldn’t have. What began as "getting to know you" conversation soon devolved into round robins of interrogation regarding each potluck dish to ensure it did not contain one of the offending ingredients.

I watched, helpless, as my fantasy holiday dinner quickly turned into a series of military maneuvers designed to preserve commitments to sponsors and ward off self-reproach. 

At one point, the anxiety of the heated conversations overwhelmed me, and I called my friend Allen. Mensch that he is, he jumped in a cab and came all the way from Brooklyn to lend his support. As my guests continued to dissect each other's decisions around what food was acceptable and what wasn't, I basted the turkey and waited on tenterhooks for the popper to pop.

Allen arrived and promptly offered me exactly what I needed. We snuck out the back door into my postage-stamp sized yard and smoked a joint. Relaxed and ready to take on the collective neuroses, including my own, I returned to the kitchen and fussed over the pots on the stove while peeking into the oven every three minutes to check for a fully popped popper.

When the cooking time reached six hours, Allen and I checked on Pepe only to find the skin on the bird still smooth.

"Honey,” Allen asked. “Where is Pepe's Popper?"

We looked at each other for a split second before we lost ourselves in raucous laughter that was in no way associated with our earlier trek to the back yard. In between fits, we shushed each other, not wanting to draw guests out of the living room, curious to discover what was so funny.

Not long after we recalibrated, folks began to straggle into the kitchen, inquiring about when we were going to eat. At twenty-eight, this was my inaugural turkey, and I felt the pressure to make sure it was perfect.

We were now thirty minutes past the recommended cooking time. In a panic, I pulled it out of the oven for closer inspection. Without a meat thermometer I hesitated to serve it lest food poisoning become the next topic of conversation.

Allen suggested flipping it over and as soon as we did, we saw it. Not fully protruding, the popper was barely a bump on the skin because

I had cooked the turkey upside down!

We finally sat down to eat, and the exchanges became more pleasant as the tryptophan kicked in. We talked about what we were all grateful for and shared our plans for the Christmas holiday.

Not all of the food was delicious – there was only so much you could do back then to make stuffing without flour or a sugar-free pumpkin pie – but we all agreed it was the best turkey we'd ever had.

What started as a disaster turned out to be one of my fondest holiday memories. I felt loved and supported and part of a community.

All because I couldn't tell which end of the turkey was right side up! 

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