A Different Thanksgiving...

I blame my dental hygienist, I really do. After all, had she not asked me what our family was doing for Thanksgiving as I was laying flat on my back unable to properly answer her question, she would not have mentioned that she and her family spent the previous Thanksgiving in Park City having someone else do all the work.

Yes, it's really her fault.

Because she told me what their family did, I wouldn't have mentioned what their family did to my wife. And she wouldn't have called her mother to suggest we do the same thing. And had that not happened, we would have ended up taking three days to prepare all the food and have it at one of our homes.

I'm not saying that's a bad thing--not in the least. It's just the thought of doing something different sounded interesting, a lot less work, and fun. Of course, we'd lose out on all those leftovers...

Or so we thought.

We made reservations at the Grub Steak Restaurant in Park City. There would be eight of us, six from our family and my wife's parents. Leading up to the big day my wife and I discussed about how things were different. For me, things weren't that different--I wasn't the one who did all that prep work. It was a nice break for my wife and the kids.

We worried about a storm that blew in the night before--Park City is, after all as noted by Lloyd Christmas, "In the Rockies." Thanksgiving Day turned out to be beautiful. Our reservations were at 4pm. We arrived a few minutes before.

The menu--we could have a traditional Thanksgiving meal, or steaks and other options. We all chose turkey and the fixins'. I'm glad we did. There was so much food! We all ended up bringing home leftovers--mine fed me two lunches. The place was packed. I didn't see any non-turkey plates. And the service was exceptional. They had so many people working, all to serve those of us who didn't want to do the work ourselves.

Yes, the house didn't smell like delicious food for days before and after Thanksgiving. Now, I didn't get to take a nap while a NFL game blared on the TV. There were definitely things we gave up. This year we tried something new, a Thanksgiving we'll hopefully all remember. And isn't the point of the holiday anyway, making holiday memories and appreciating our blessings, especially family?

Yes. Yes is it.

Will we do it again next year? We don't know. We'll have to see.