Last year I moved into a townhome after my wife and I separated. Her and my kids went to Ohio to spend Thanksgiving with her side of the family (it’s something we’d always done even as a family). I was supposed to go to Puerto Rico last Thanksgiving, but that didn’t work out. So I ended up at a friend’s house with their family.

Fast forward to this year, and I now have my own home. My youngest decided that he didn’t want me to be alone for the holiday, so he opted to stay with me instead of going up to Ohio with his mom and brother. He also asked me to cook ham, sweet corn, and mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving dinner. I got the smallest spiral-cut glazed ham I could find, and cooked up a can of sweet corn, and made mashed potatoes from a box. I had never done this before because in Ohio there was always the in-group of family that took care of cooking, and I wasn’t part of that group.

My youngest said it was the best meal he had in a long time. He kept going back for more and more ham. As I was cleaning up, he commented how sad he’s going to be when we run out of the ham. His only criticisms were that the potatoes were a little plain in comparison to everything else, and that there needed to be a bitter side to offset the sweetness of everything else. Very high praise coming from him, as he’s still in the picky phase with his eating.

Now I sit waiting for the dishes to finish the wash cycle, while my kid is playing some Roblox game and my dog is laying beside him drifting off to sleep (she got her share of ham too).

Today was a really good day, and it would have been a shame not to share it with somebody.

Happy Thanksgiving, y’all.