My First NYC Thanksgiving
By Thursday November 26 1981, I’d lived in New York City for a little more than eight months. Already ensconced in my second shabby rent-stabilized studio apartment and about to begin my second job in business journalism, I elected to remain in Manhattan for Thanksgiving and salt away funds for a Christmas visit with my family in Cincinnati. At that point, my circle of friends in the city was small — non-existent, actually, though that would change over the next six months. So the famous Macy’s parade was the obvious (and possibly only) choice for an authentic holiday experience.
I slept in that morning. After a classic breakfast (eggs potatoes toast and multiple cups of watery coffee) at the diner directly below my apartment, I headed southwest from 14th Street toward the Hudson River. The usually hectic Meatpacking District, which bustled with commerce during the day and teemed with shadowy cruisers and lurkers at night, was dead quiet.
The river gleamed in the brash sunlight and a rude wind ripped through the down jacket that had kept me warm though four frigid Michigan winters. I ventured onto the abandoned pier just below the Department of Sanitation, gingerly sidestepping the gaping holes in the rotten wood structure. Down the river I could just barely make out the Statue of Liberty. Inspiring? Yeah. But after a few shivery minutes I began trudging back toward civilization.
Sometime in the early afternoon I walked up Fifth Avenue and caught the literal tail end of the Macy’s parade. If I’m being honest, it was dispiriting. Threading my way home through the dissipating crowds, I felt hungry and belately considered where I should have dinner. Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday: for the food and the family time, not to mention the relaxing absence of gift-giving pressure. In 1981, alone in the big city, I was so determined to assert my independence and break from all tradition that I ignored my instincts and ducked into the first restaurant in my path: an anonymous and undistinguished Chinese place south of Herald Square.
Many years later, living on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, I learned that the Wednesday eve before Thanksgiving was a traffic nightmare both in the streets and on the sidewalks, as people throng to the area around the Natural History Museum where the giant cartoon-character balloons are inflated for their star-turn in the next day’s parade. To be avoided.
As Thanksgiving day 1981 waned, I digested my Moo Goo Gai Pan and walked downtown in the darkening late afternoon gloom. Looking down a side street I saw a huge parade balloon being deflated. That’s the lingering image of my first NYC Thanksgiving. Luckily, that day was the only time I truly felt lonely in the city. I also felt determined to stay, though for the next several years, I went back to Ohio for Thanksgiving.
