Memoirous

  Another Thanksgiving excerpt from my YA novel, Beyond Paradise On the eve of WWII Louise Keller and her family moved to the Philippine Islands. When the war broke out her father was away picking up the missionary school teacher in Manila and ended up separated from his family. Louise and her mother are eventually rounded up by the Japanese and placed into Allied internment camps for civilians. They are in one such camp—at a former university St. Tomas in Manila where this excerpt takes place. Louise has not seen her father for two years —since the war started—and has no idea where he is. Peter a young man the family met on the boat coming over is also interned at St. Tomas and is in possession of an illegal radio. Thanksgiving in St. Tomas I’ve heard it said that when a cup is mended it is actually strongest where the glue holds it together. Mother was like that—strong, but still fragile in places. We learned to lean on each other. Peter brought us news of victories in the Solomo...

I’m in charge of the turkey—what does this mean?—It means do not kill the family with unsafe poultry. I’ve had too many experiences with unthawed turkey on cooking day. So I told my daughter I wanted at least a week for the bird to thaw in the downstairs mini-beer-fridge. Now 4 days to go and it is still crunchy-semi-frozen. I know we can put it in the sink for an hour or two for the final final, but it is unbelievable how frozen these frozen turkeys can get. Meanwhile, I’ll work on the pie and together we’ll do the cranberry relish. It’s been a while since we’ve cooked together and, with the new baby, it was decided that we wouldn’t travel, but stay home. I’ve drawn up graphs and charts and step-by-step to-dos. Yet, this hasn’t stopped me from worrying. Sheesh, I can ride my bike across the country solo and summit mountains, but cooking a meal has me petrified. We’re still days away and I can’t help imagining serving a botulated turkey.

On the eve of WWII Louise Keller and her family moved to the Philippine Islands. When the war broke out her father was away picking up the missionary school teacher in Manila and ended up separated from his family. Louise and her mother are eventually rounded up by the Japanese and placed into Allied internment camps for civilians. They are in one such camp—at a former university St. Tomas in Manila where this excerpt takes place. Louise has not seen her father for two years —since the war started—and has no idea where he is. Peter a young man the family met on the boat coming over is also interned at St. Tomas and is in possession of an illegal radio. Thanksgiving in St. Tomas I’ve heard it said that when a cup is mended it is actually strongest where the glue holds it together. Mother was like that—strong, but still fragile in places. We learned to lean on each other. Peter brought us news of victories in the Solomon Islands. Little by little, island-hopping, the A...

This time of year always stirs up a lot of memories. And one memory I had over Thanksgiving--actually people kept reminding me--was my mother's cranberry relish recipe. about 5 cups whole cranberries start with 1 cup sugar, but you'll definitely be adding more and 1 WHOLE orange, the whole thing I remember when I called Mom to ask for it--she made a point of saying, the whole orange. But I usually cut it up just to check for seeds and make sure that pimply thing on one end has been removed. Way back when, before what we now call a food processor, Mom had a huge kitchen contraption made out of die-cast metal and weighing about 50 lbs that did almost everything. It was like a wood chipper. A WHOLE orange was nothing for this baby. It could juice a rock. She had attachments she'd put on--like she used to make her own goose liver pâté .The thing actually had more attachments than her ElectroLux vacuum cleaner--another heavy-duty appliance. They were all made out of old ...