Two weeks before Thanksgiving, I caught COVID-19. While I recovered just fine and am healthy now, it didn’t feel right traveling home for the holiday with so much unknown about the pandemic and the virus at hand. If I had traveled home, it wouldn’t have felt right had I walked into the kitchen, typically filled with family members, and said “I brought the rolls… and a side of covid!”. So, I stayed in my apartment and planned on skipping the holiday altogether.
That was until my mom saved the day. On Thanksgiving, my mother, Brenda Carter, called and explained how she had spent the previous evening cooking all of my favorite holiday foods and was driving from Houston to have a social distanced lunch in the parking garage of my apartment. After she arrived and had set up our chairs six feet apart from one another, she served me my thanksgiving meal on a gorgeous hand-carved oak serving tray.
One thing you need to know, Carter is a retired home economics teacher so she’s a fantastic cook and enjoys creating an experience around food. On my serving tray, along with my meal, was a small crystal vase with a single rose and baby’s breath, another crystal vase with a few sprigs of mint. But the food she cooked wasn’t ordinary holiday food. All of the ingredients she used were either grown in her garden or her farmer’s garden. Meaning it was all organic and ethically sourced. This was also my first Thanksgiving as a vegetarian. Making it my first thanksgiving without turkey.
When asked about why she drove the four hour round trip to celebrate Thanksging Carter responded,
“I wanted to do something special. I knew this was a hard year and I couldn’t leave my daughter alone on Thanksgiving.”
