CHAPTER 6 TURKEY AT 33,000

My first Thanksgiving away from family and in the sky. Don’t be sad for me, it was great. This excerpt excludes a part in the middle that discusses turbulence and a plane’s ability to handle it. You’ll have to hope this gets published to hear about that.

The flight attendant working the right aisle on this B767 in first class was Olga. She had blond hair on top of a round face and the same Swedish accent as the Helga I once worked with. This was in the kitchen of a Texas hotel run by a German chef with the help of a cook from El Salvador. The dishwasher was from Mexico, the waiter from Ireland, and the waitress from Ohio. It was a culturally diverse place. I was in a high school work program and worked there in the afternoons, instead of taking classes. I enjoyed the little reminder of that memory in hearing that accent again.

Olga had a warm smile embraced by simple age lines radiating into her cheeks. She brought out the linens, which were placed on our tray tables followed by a tray with our appetizer and salad. A queen cart was wheeled out and we were offered our choice of salad dressing, bread and offered a glass of water. I had my champagne refilled several times before our entrées were delivered.

I can only remember one Thanksgiving in my life that has been interrupted. It was the Thanksgiving of 1976. I was all of nine years old and my mother, stepfather and I were getting ready to head out to a friend’s house for the big feast. I was dressed and ready to go when the hysterics began. I guess the reason my mother had not prepared a feast herself, or why we were not out of town with family, was that Mom was very pregnant. My brother thought he would be a turkey and come out on this day, thus causing the labor-induced hysterics. I was shuttled at the last minute to my best friend’s house, three houses down. I remember that Robert’s dining room was full of people I’d never seen before. I also remember that they were thrilled to have me over, and that they were genuinely excited for my mother. But I don’t remember their faces and I don’t recall the meal at all. My mind was seized by the thrill of becoming a brother, and I was in a spell wondering what was going on with my mother at the hospital. The birth was uncomplicated and I had a brother born on Thanksgiving Day. As the nurses cleaned him to place in the arms of my mother, he emptied his bladder for the first time…urinating all over himself. I tell my brother that he was a self-basting turkey! He didn’t know any better, only being a few minutes old, and he takes the ribbing well today.

While this particular Thanksgiving at 33,000 feet didn’t have the miracle of the one in 1976, it was also interrupted. This time it was turbulence that did the trick. It got so bumpy in the middle of our appetizer that the pilot asked the flight attendants to take a seat. We sat there bumping along for a good five minutes. It was the longest duration of turbulence I think I had been through to that point, although it was not too severe.

When at last it got smooth once more, Olga delivered my plate of turkey with dressing and mashed potatoes with peas. It was a moist bird and the dressing was thick. The dressing was Yankee style, not the southern cornbread style I am accustomed to, but very tasty non-the-less. The peas were cooked to where they still had texture and their skins were still smooth and glossy; just right. Not having to worry about going to the kitchen for seconds or thirds, I indulged in the ice cream sundaes now gracing the queen cart along with a selection of liqueurs and chocolate chip cookies. As I sat in my aisle seat watching the credits roll from the humorous clay-mation movie, Olga came to collect my tray. Teresa was to my right and opened the window shades. Below us was the miracle I would receive this Thanksgiving. Not a brother, but a view.

We were somewhere over Utah, which was smothered in white snow for as far as we could see. The sky was turning colors as the sun set down, smearing purple into pinks. A layer of clouds could be seen in the distance, but below us the ground was quite visible. There were so many mountains that it seems like it would take a person a lifetime to explore them all. The snow-capped peaks reflected the spectacle of the colors from above. Mountain after mountain, their jagged roughness reaching up towards us, but they could not accomplish their lofty dreams of touching the heavens. This must be why they reflect the sky as they do. It’s the only way they can take part in the lofty spectacle of the skies when viewed from so high. When on the ground, the simple fact that they reach so high is grand enough. This was a view made to be seen only from the heavens.

As the sun continued to lower itself through the distant clouds, the colors moved into blues. Now the trees at the bases of the peaks, and through the valleys, appeared as stubble on the face of an old man. This was because of the way the snow had fallen around the trees, leaving the evergreen branches exposed; snow peppered with trees like stubble on a soft white face. It was magic. Teresa and I sat there gazing out forever in silence but listening to the beauty of the gods which exploded in our minds.

When the sun was gone and all that we could see now were the stars above and the lights of small towns below, I fell into a sleep that must have been better than any nap taken in any living room that day! It was a long and exhausting day and my nap was its reward.