Thanksgiving, the Good Earth, friends

Wow, I haven't blogged in a month now, since Halloween.

Thanksgiving was great fun this year. We were all reasonably healthy (the kids had runny noses). Cameo and I split up the cooking for Thanksgiving dinner again and it was a true feast. Thank goodness the turkey turned out well - I always feel I don't know what I'm doing when I try to make big meat dishes. I have a new favorite dessert - Bryan's mom's recipe for "Captain Scott H's Key Lime Pie." Yum. The stores here don't carry key lime kool aid, so I used lemon lime and it was OK, but if I ever do find key lime kool aid I'll buy a lot. :-) Cameo's pumpkin gooey cake was very delicious too. We had our friend Jill and Buzz's friend Alison and family and we all played Catch Phrase after dinner. A good game you can play anywhere with any number of people. The kids were playing semi-independently, though at one point I wondered where Sam had gone so I checked. I found Ava pressing down on him in a corner with one of the chair pillows in the toy room. He wasn't complaining, just trying to sit up despite having a pillow and Ava on top of him, and Ava explained something about how she was trying to play with something (translation: trying to keep Sam out of her toys).

It was interesting preparing and eating such a decadent feast while in the midst of reading about the famine in The Good Earth. Several thoughts I've had while reading it...

- Women in this country are very, very lucky to live here and now.
- I thought I worked hard and for little reward in residency - reading about how the people worked themselves to the bone on the land (and still risked starvation) really puts things in perspective!
- Things happen "when the rich are too rich, and the poor are too poor." Reminds me of the line in Les Miserables, "Something's gotta happen now and something's gotta give."
- The protagonist of The Good Earth is a man, but I think Pearl Buck secretly makes the real hero of the story a woman. A plain, silent, selfless, sad woman who no one wanted.
- I cried when I read about Olan's death and Wang Lung's response. I'm pretty sure I liked this book well enough when I first read it in high school (20+ years ago now!?) but I think I appreciate it much more now. How many other books were half wasted on me in high school and college?

Anyway - not much more can be said about a long weekend of feasting and friends and time with my beloved family. I am deeply thankful.