Them, me, you and us

(Editor’s Note: A dear fellow writer and blogger, Hannah Joy Curious asked if she could include a lovely holiday piece of hers as part of our Thanksgiving Collected, and naturally I was delighted to oblige. This is that piece. Please visit her home blog The Ideal Wife Giveaway to read more of her wonderful words.)

The house was a big glass donut nestled deep into the woods of New England. We all piled inside at about the same time, some clink-clunking their way up the stairs, others carefully balancing delicate things in boxes, anxious not to spill their precious cargo. Myriam looked like a funambulist with her immense tray of picture perfect deviled eggs. She was so determined they should arrive at their destination in the exact same state they had left her kitchen that she didn’t actually drive but commanded her car to magically glide along, dodging the potholes that scar many Massachusetts country lanes.

Without Myriam, I’d have stayed home at the tiny cottage by the lake, surrounded by squirrels and the last of the foliage. In lieu of celebration, there would have been a tin of tuna that suspiciously smelled like cat food and me sitting on the deck wrapped in a plaid blanket, gazing at the sky, reading until sunset and slowly draining a big pot of coffee. Alone, at peace, content.

My mentor, Myriam was also my wheels, ensuring that I got safely to and from work six days a week as well as to the store and mall whenever needed. She made rural life a breeze for the little foreigner who had never learnt to drive, never once calling me a social misfit although we both knew that living down a dirt track in the middle of the woods with no means of transport was as foolish as it was impractical.

That day, Myriam and I were the only foreigners at what was essentially an intimate gathering made up of assorted friends and relatives of Shaun and Kathy’s. Horrified at the thought that either of us should be spending the holiday alone, they had insisted we join them. Their invitation was delivered in a tone that implied refusal would break their heart so we readily accepted, a little taken aback by such strong and sudden kindness.

As soon as we arrived, we were adopted by their extended tribe and treated like we belonged, with random strangers addressing us as if we had only just parted company the day before. After unloading my pies onto the last free corner of one of the many tables groaning with food, I set out to try and understand how all the people present were actually related to one another. Once word got out about this, everyone thought it might be fun to come up with tales so impossibly tall that made figuring out how those folks fitted together nigh on impossible. But fit together we somehow all did, around Shaun, Kathy and two large polydactyl cats called Flotsam and Jetsam.

With laughter as our soundtrack, we all talked and munched our way through a day that stretched beyond sunset, only being allowed to leave on condition that we take home at least one box of food which Shaun and Kathy would thrust into our hands even if we tried to resist. Oddly perhaps, I had only known my hosts for a short while before then.

Just a few weeks had passed since I had showed up on their office doorstep, sporting the bewildered look common to the jet lagged and travel weary and wheeling behind me a little suitcase stuffed with food from a tiny island in the middle of the Atlantic. In those parts, it’s not every day some unknown person flies in with a mini grocery store in tow, so not only did I get to meet the entire office shortly after arriving but they also remembered my name from day one.

To Shaun and Kathy – and to Myriam who took me under her wing – I will always owe my first – and to date only – Thanksgiving.

Three years later, memories of this day live on as a reminder that happiness simply means connecting with another person. For this I give thanks to them.

And, most of all, to you.