Our Thanksgiving dinner was shared by relatives and friends who live in New York City as well as some who came from as far away as San Francisco, Boston, Columbia, Maryland, and even Port of Spain, Trinidad. My cousin who lives in Trinidad came to surprise her sister who lives in Maryland, who travels with her daughters to be with us every year at this time. My cousin from San Francisco came to support her sister from Boston who is in the midst of a divorce. We had many sets of sisters in attendance this year, and a few men, too: My husband who did most of the cooking, my son, his best friend, two cousins-in-law, my 7-year-old nephew. There were 23 of us in all. The house was wonderfully crowded and comfortable. My 92 year-old aunt didn't feel up to joining us, so later in the evening about a dozen of us, nieces and nephews and grands, trooped over to her apartment to bring her dinner and dessert and wrap her in our convivial mood.
Here is a snap of my kids taken before the festivities. We had moved the living room furniture around to create more empty space for "flow." My husband retired to the bedroom while everyone else issued energetic opinions and instructions about how everything should be rearranged. As my husband famously commented at our wedding about the relatives who were about to become his family, "Everybody is a general. There are so soldiers here."
