What saves November from being my least favorite month is that it contains my most favorite holiday.  No gifts, just being together around the table with a menu that is a given and is loved by all.  It is a command performance in our family, and except for the year Jeremy lived in Chile, we’ve always been together.

The rituals will take place tomorrow—frantic preparation of the last pie and the stuffing first thing in the morning, a family walk around the reservoir once the turkey is in the oven, a quick detour from the path to a nearby Dunkin’ Donuts (embarrassing to admit), and then the annual family picture that a random  passerby takes at exactly the same place each year. (We do offer him/her a doughnut.)

This year the kids are invited to a wedding on Sunday, and everyone will leave us a day earlier than usual.  The grandchildren are not excited about a baby sitter in a hotel.  So in a phone conversation with seven-year old Leo the other night he asked, “Grammy, why can’t Grady and I stay with you and have Mommy and Daddy drive back from New York to pick us up in Boston after the wedding?”

Add eight more hours to their trip home on the traffic-filled Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend?

Fine with me.