thanksgiving à la française

So, before I went on my long homesick rant last week, I had no idea Thanksgiving away from home could be so good. I realized that this is, in fact, my first Thanksgiving away from home in New York -- because we always have the holiday off from school, and it's always too short to travel anywhere, so this is actually a big milestone for me. i was a little bummed that there would be no turkey or mashed potatoes or apple pie involved, but was determined to make the most of it and ended up organizing a dinner with an American friend of mine at school. We invited a motley group of friends - a Canadian, two Japanese girls, and three French students. I went grocery shopping after class today to pick up ingredients for a cranberry-corn bread side dish and a chocolate tart dessert. While I was pretty panicky during the preparation period (especially since I couldn't figure out how to use the oven) everything turned out great in the end -- the company was good, the cider was just the right touch alcoholic, and the food was delicious. My American friend is vegetarian, so we were turkey-less, but she made a delicious pumpkin soup, stove top stuffing and mashed sweet potato. And we got to explain the holiday to our international guests which made it all the more special.

And after getting off the phone with my parents, I realized how disappointed I would have been to be home where they're eating a pre-prepared meal ordered off the internet. I've complained endlessly about how my parents do that. And it's not that I don't miss my parents or being home on this holiday of holidays, but I now know that it doesn't have to be so terrible.

But my mother nearly forgot to mention that she and my dad got tickets to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade from the ABC studios in Times Square. There's my mom for you.

Tomorrow I leave for Nice to visit my Georgetown friend Kristin, where another Thanksgiving feast will be had. But I can't be prouder of the event that I helped organize tonight and how wonderful my Thanksgiving turned out to be.