Here we are, already in December. It was a busy month, even after the 11th. In fact, I felt let down after all of the Veterans Day hoopla was over but I still had to do Thanksgiving so the letdown part had to be put off until the day other people went shopping. It's better now but there were a couple of days there that don't bear thinking of.

I don't have any particular memories of Thomas and Thanksgiving--since I am not enthusiastic about turkey, especially turkey that I am theoretically cooking, it's never been a holiday of enormous importance in my mind. Of course, the year that I ordered all prepared dinner from La Madeleine which meant that all I did was pick up a box containing our meal, OK that year I found out that my family really preferred that I cook, no matter how unenthusiastically. We did go to a movie afterwards (Toy Story, I think). They liked that. But I've never bought Thanksgiving dinner again except the year that Thomas died. That year, as I must have written early in this blog, we went out to dinner at Maggiano's in Chevy Chase. The restaurant was incredibly crowded and noisy and the dinner was served family style so there were a lot of elbows flying around and I don't think I've ever been that miserable in my life. It was just me and Richard and Matthew and my mother-in-law Edith who I felt was resentful that we were in a restaurant (she never said anything, I was probably just projecting). But as a friend of mine observed later, we were going to be miserable no matter what we did.

Every Thanksgiving since then has been home-cooked and the day is no longer a focus of misery. I still don't like turkey.

I have some thank you notes to write. Several people had Masses said for Thomas this year, and a contribution to the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund was made in Thomas's memory (the contributor may wish to remain anonymous, but I am very grateful!). This afternoon, I am meeting a reporter to talk about ways that people can contribute either time or money to our service members. I'm mostly going to point out organizations, including a couple of small ones that I know of, who are doing this kind of work. This is not about me and that is a very good thing.