24 Comments
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Phil Tajitsu Nash's avatar

What a beautiful memoir. The trial and error aspect of your dad’s approaches was quite entertaining. The vats of turkey chow mein showed an entrepreneurial spirit, and your description of eating in Horn and Hardart was both heartwarming (your family) and heartbreaking (as you described the folks eating alone). Happy Thanksgiving!

Sharon Hom's avatar

Phil, Thank you for taking time to read and share your kind comments🙏♥️

Gloria Horton-Young's avatar

Thanksgiving—a time to give thanks but also to honor the hurt, loneliness, and loss we’ve endured. It is a moment to embrace the love that intertwines with our sadness, guiding us toward gratitude for all we have known and all we still hold dear.

Thank you for blessing us with your memories.

Sharon Hom's avatar

Thank you Gloria for making the time to read them during your big NY adventures🙏♥️

Mai Suga's avatar

I'm glad I found your writing today. You've woven memories of your past and the complexities of family into one piece. Thank you for sharing your story.

Sharon Hom's avatar

Thank you for finding them!

Switter’s World's avatar

America and Americans! We are a multi-splendored, quarrelsome, beautiful, eccentric, lovable mess.

I think you captured the spirit of Thanksgiving perfectly. Thank you, Sharon.

Sharon Hom's avatar

I think you described my family😹

Switter’s World's avatar

I think I described everyone’s family!

David Kirkby's avatar

Oh - Sharon - I loved reading this. I so wish I had met your Dad!! This is so beautiful, and human, and funny too, that I just restacked it. I hope that's okay.

Best Wishes - Dave :)

Sharon Hom's avatar

Thank you for such an embracing response♥️ And thank you for restacking! It has been difficult to write about my family, especially my father. He’s now 99, and frustrates and infuriates the whole family. Writing these stories surprised me because I discovered a space more generous towards him in recovering these memories. But it’s so much more complex.

Jody Frank's avatar

Thank you so much for sharing these poignant stories of your family.

Sharon Hom's avatar

Thank you Jody!

Sukti Dhital's avatar

So lovely Sharon - I felt transported to many times and worlds. Hugs to you and the fam!

Sharon Hom's avatar

Thank you Sukti!

Alex Tomić's avatar

Sharon this is such lovely atmospheric writing. Thank you 🎊❤️

Sharon Hom's avatar

🙏♥️ So glad you liked it!

eleanor yung's avatar

Thank you for sharing this wonderful story of life, of yours and your family’s. The complexity of our stories just brings us closer. ❤️

Sharon Hom's avatar

And you know how difficult it has been, on so many levels! Thank you dear friend for sharing everything through the decades(!)♥️♥️♥️

Lidija P Nagulov's avatar

I could not have read a more heartwarming and uplifting thing today than your beautiful text. And your father sounds like an absolute legend.

Sharon Hom's avatar

Thank you♥️♥️♥️ but families are soooo complicated. I am just beginning to be able to write about them.

Lidija P Nagulov's avatar

Absolutely. People are the weirdest, most complex things.

Cheese's avatar

That is absolutely the loveliest thanksgiving piece I have read. You write your family so beautifully.

I’m from the UK where thanksgiving is not a thing, candied yams? An automat? It’s all fascinating.

Sharon Hom's avatar

Thank you for your kind comments! It’s a complicated tough family, as all families are. Thanksgiving was clearly a foreign thing for my family too 😹