Thanksgiving in context

The liquor store was closed for Thanksgiving - go figure - so I brought some Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee as a gift to my professor's house - never go to someone's house without a gift. It turns out that he had invited four stranded students to his house for Thanksgiving. There was also his mother, wife, daughter, brother-in-law and friend (from grad school). It's amazing how much more you understand when you see someone in context. Professor G's context - family and friends - showed that his utter insanity is perhaps less shocking than I had previously thought.

It was really nice for him to invite us to his home. Not many people would do that. The food was awesome, and once we got into the swing of the madness the awkward silences got fewer and further between.

One thing did stand out though. I was pleasantly bantering with the brother-in-law about his hair. He was full mountain man. He was amazing! Over the course of the night, we learnt that he lived in a place that allowed him to have neither water nor electricity bills. He had a full beard and two scraggly pig-tails reaching far down his back. He said, that since the army made him shave, that he had not cut his hair since he had come back from Vietnam. A small alarm bell went off in my head. Then he said that if we look at owls, we realize that being covered in hair allows you to be more sensitive to your environment. Intruiguing. His hair is how he transmits waves into the universe and how we receive them. That's why indians pray with feathers, 'and that's why you have pubic hair'. What?!?! "That's why you have pubic hair."

The table was silent. I guess everyone has one crazy relative. Someone changed the subject to pie.

The dinner was wonderful and memorable. That family makes a mean pecan pie. We left to find the other students on campus.

We found some friends in one of the houses. They were the ones who did not want to go the president's house and who had not been invited to a professors house. We all scrounged up a dinner or scrambled eggs, salmon sandwiches, hamburger meat, pasta with tomato sauce, rice, chicken, sardines, octopus and bread. I don't know much about the awkward holiday "Thanksgiving" but it is wonderful to spend quality time with good friends. We later watched Chronicles of Riddick. I wonder when they are making 2 and 3.