lentil loaf

my friend annie looked a little surprised and said "this is my first white people thanksgiving." i think her family is kind of fucked up and she's had a pretty crappy year so i brought her to my aunt judy's where i go every year. she's never had the kind of thanksgiving where it's like a big family, with a mother figure cooking huge piles of food for everyone. after dinner we lay on the floor in front of the fire like big cats, rubbing our bellies.

aunt judy isn't really my aunt, except in all the ways that matter.
i don't think you really have to share dna to be family.

she makes me lentil loaf because i don't eat turkey. it's basically cooked lentils mashed up with brown rice and theoretically, cooked onions and garlic but you can't really taste those. then you plop it in a loaf pan and bake it. it has the approximate color and texture of something you can't talk about over dinner. at the end of the meal there was only one smallish serving taken out of the very corner of the dish (mine), so now there's 97% of a lentil loaf in my fridge.

but isn't it great how people with the hugest hearts will take care of you? i tell my friends that i pretend to like lentil loaf because it's so nice of judy to make it for me, and i don't want to seem unappreciative. but the real reason is that i love what it stands for. i love everything about it, other than how it tastes and looks. it's squishy brown love in a pan.

so tonight i am thankful for lentil loaf.
for my beautiful amazing family and friends.
and for the fact that i'm going to be really regular for about the next five days.