Thanksgiving

We are headed full-swing into Christmas -- whew! -- but a note about Thanksgiving before it is gone completely: We decided to stay in California this year for Thanksgiving, and after paging through the November issue of Sunset magazine, decided to haul our turkey and all of the sides, tables and chairs, glasses and china, bottles of wine down to the beach for dinner. Our friends joined us for the bright, windy celebration, which made it even more fun to sit bundled in coats, looking at the ocean.

The last couple of months, we have searched (and searched) for a home. I've searched within and without, weighing and examining, driving neighborhoods, researching schools, walking in and out of empty spaces, working to find our next place, which we haven't found. But as an insightful friend pointed out to me, our meal on the beach, under the wide open sky with no walls around us and no roof, ended up being the perfect illustration of what I've been realizing: there we were, the four of us together, home. And one of these days we will find a new set of walls in a better school district to surround us, but until then, we can still be home. And for that, this year, I am thankful.