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IT ADDS A NICE TOUCH TO GET ONE'S THANKSGIVING TURKEY in a serendipitous manner. Yesterday I was wishing for a turkey raised without lots of interventions--hormones, antibiotics, chemicals flagrantly sprayed--but despaired of finding such a fowl in time, seeing as how I'd ho-hummed my way through the month without doing any research into the matter.

Then last night I happened to call a friend to make sure she wasn't going to be alone on Thanksgiving Day. Not only did she regale me with the tale of how it developed she'd be hosting the meal for a tidy group of her own, but when I mentioned my procrastination in procuring a bird to serve to mine, she passed along a valuable tip. "There's a place not far from here where they sell 'natural' chickens," she said. "They might have turkeys." Then she gave me rough directions for getting there--on roads I did not know.

Thus my first order of the day this morning was chasing after a fowl--what I hoped wouldn't be a wild goose.









And what do you know, turns out that I did see geese, but they weren't wild. They were plump and domestic and populating the farm with the sign that proclaimed: "Uncommonly Good Meat!"

The corners of my mouth went up.




"Yes, we've got turkeys!" the young man said, and I was thinking he must be a brother to Lady Luck.

"What size did you order?"
Hmm, right then I noticed his eyes didn't look so much like hers.

"Oh, dear. I didn't place an order," I said. "I just heard of this place last night." I noticed his nose was more nicely shaped. Why, he didn't really look like her at all! I held my breath.

"Well, we've got about three that aren't ordered," he said. "They're going fast!" And then he smiled--my goodness, the splitting image of Lady L's smile!


Naturally, I myself was smiling as I headed home with my ever so natural turkey.


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