HOLLY NADLER
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Memories play as big a part in Thanksgiving as turkey and pumpkin pie. Last year I spent the holiday with my friend, Dawn Greeley, who died last May. Our 23-year-old sons, Alex and Charlie, who’d been friends since the 10th grade, had touched down on the Island for Turkey Time. Also in attendance at the Greeleys’ unpretentious but quietly luxe home on Old Ridge Hill Road in Chilmark, were Dawn’s husband, Roger, and Dawn’s mother, up from Connecticut, whom everyone called Nana, an adorable lady with a round face, huge grey eyes, and a height that could top five feet only if she wore four-inch heels, which she did not.
The occasion was laced with poignancy because only weeks earlier Dawn had learned that a recurring cancer, which she had successfully suppressed several times, had shown up again, this time in the form of tumors in her liver. Her doctors had essentially told her to measure out the remainder of her life, not in cups, but in serving spoons.
At this point all of us who loved Dawn thought not in terms of tablespoons but in miracles. She was still her beautiful, funny, super-smart self, still perfectly coiffed and apparelled. On that Thanksgiving Day she wore a cream colored silk blouse, a scarf of lavender, blue, brown and beige, with little bits of those same hues picked up in dangling earrings. She was on a new drug protocol that slowed her down, and we tried to get her to stay off her feet: Nana, Roger and I would do all the cooking.
But you don’t slow down a bionic woman like Dawn Greeley. She tried to supervise from a bar stool situated at the far end of her enormous, U-shaped black granite kitchen counter, but before you could get her back with an overturned chair and a zookeeper’s whip, she had a whisk in her hand and cream in a cold silver bowl, or a peeler and a recalcitrant carrot.
Meanwhile Nana washed and cut vegetables, and Roger minded the turkey. I produced a sweet potato bisque that we sipped from mugs as we labored over the meal. Nana found it luscious, and kept asking me for the ingredients. I didn’t have the heart to tell her it had enough cream in it to keep the Ben & Jerry’s plant fully operational for a year.
The year before, Dawn and I had found ourselves bereft of family and yet free as birds, so we met at the Harbor View for its unbelievable Thanksgiving spread. Over the course of several hours, we sat in a booth, ordered Bloody Marys, returned to the buffet table, and talked about life, family, her painting, my writing. As always in conversation with Dawn, at times we were deeply philosophical, at other times we traded names of favorite face creams, and at still other times threw back our heads and laughed with abandon.
I don’t know how you’re supposed to behave with friends who are soon to leave you. All I could offer Dawn was what came naturally. When, a little over a year ago, the Damocles Sword of a diagnosis hung over her, I never let a visit go by when I didn’t tell her I loved her. When she spoke about her cancer, tears spilled down my cheeks. Perhaps the better etiquette would have been to force myself to be more stoical? I prefer to think that Dawn created a zone of safety and openness for her friends and family where we could all be ourselves. In truth, she had always provided that space for us.
Dawn’s son, Alex, will be home in Chilmark this week, down from his high-tech job in Franklin, but not before picking up at the airport a certain young lady whom he met on a recent west coast trip to visit dad Roger in Sonoma. I’ve always had a soft spot for Alex, out of all of Charlie’s friends. Alex has a dry wit and a hilarious set of facial expressions. I used to tell him that if he ever wanted to try acting, I could picture him in the next generation of Saturday Night Live performers; a better-looking Jon Lovitz. Dawn used to shudder at this advice and, thank God, Alex pursued his passion for computers at Carnegie-Mellon. But now as I plan a Thanksgiving meal around Alex’s visit, I wonder how much of my affection for him is the result of my own maternal hormones, and how much is Dawn’s spirit moving through me? Whatever the ratio, we’ll watch him grow together.
Happy Thanksgiving memories, everyone.
Also in local news, sixth grader Paul Buckley at the Oak Bluffs School will be featured along with his Wheaten terriers on Animal Planet, Friday, Nov. 29 at 8 p.m.
The Oak Bluffs School Holiday Bazaar will take place on Dec. 6.
A band concert is happening on Dec. 17th at 7:30 p.m. at the high school’s Performing Arts Center.
Winter break for the Oak Bluffs School starts on Dec. 22. School reopens on Jan. 5. Note to teachers: Please don’t bog the kids down with too much homework over the holidays (this plea comes from your friendly town columnist, and has not been cleared through academic channels.)
On the first and third Saturday at 2:30 p.m. at the Oak Bluffs Public Library, a DVD of a summer blockbuster will be screened. The first one, on Dec. 6, will spotlight Harrison Ford’s latest archaeological adventure, rated PG-13.
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