A random collection of paragraphs about my Thanksgiving visit to my in-laws.
The house of my parents-in-law is an old farmhouse. It was constructed in several steps and the process is still on-going (the last few decades have brought a new garage and enclosed porch). I don’t know which part of the house is the oldest, or whether any part of the original house, except for the foundation, still exists. I suspect some parts have been removed when other parts have been added. One symptom of building a house this way is the complexities of the interconnections between the parts of the house. For example, the kitchen has five doors. The dining room has five doors. The pantry, which was a bathroom twenty years ago, has four doors. The downstairs bathroom, which used to be a pantry until fifteen years ago, has two doors, but I think that there used to be one more that has been boarded up. The store-room, which is next to the kitchen, but which is unheated (and used in the winter like a giant refrigerator) has at least four doors. Upstairs is simpler. Each bedroom has one door. The bedroom over the kitchen is unheated, but about ten years ago they added a grate in the floor that lets heat rise from the kitchen. The grate is right over the toaster and coffee maker. It is not easy to sleep through breakfast. There are two staircases from the first floor to the second. One has sixteen steps, and the other has fifteen. I believe the latter is older.
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At a rest stop on the Mass Pike I saw an enormous woman. Rather than being uniformly fat, she had small shoulders but gigantic hips and thighs. She occupied one side of a booth by herself. Her width was wider than I can describe without you thinking I am exaggerating. I believe there are many doorways this woman cannot enter. I do not know how she can ride in an ordinary car seat. I do not believe she could possibly ever ride in an airplane: not only would she require multiple seats (I’m not sure two would be adequate) but there is no way she could get down the aisle. The thing that amazed me the most about this woman was not her size, but the fact that she appeared to be wearing ordinary, brand-name clothing. It is frightening to think that this woman is an “ordinary” size. This can’t possibly be healthy.
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I’m pretty sure that there is some sort of religious group whose female members dress in a particular way somewhere near where my in-laws live. Their hair is long and braided. Some wear hats that I think are bonnets, but I don’t really know enough about headwear to say for sure. Their dresses are plain and ankle-length. Their sleeves are long. They are perfectly neat and clean but look as though they’d just stepped out of “Little House on the Prairie” or some such. I believe I’ve seen men from this group, wearing broad-rimmed hats and long beards, but I’m not certain. Usually I just see the woman. They often have children with them. The children are quiet and well-behaved. I usually forget about them by the time I’m talking to someone who might tell me who they are or where they live. Maybe they’re Amish? Or Mennonites? When I see them, it’s usually when we’re shopping at the mall, and there are no horses or buggies in sight. I wonder what they’re shopping for. They’re shopping in the same stores as me, but I bet if we took a personal inventory of all our belongings, the intersection would be very small. I’ve never made eye contact with any of them, or exchanged words. Even in the crowded bustle of the mall, they seem separate and isolated. I don’t think they’re as curious about me as I am about them.
