Story Hour
Peanut Butter-Ball Turkey
Written by Gene B. Williams
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Can you imagine Thanksgiving under the sea? It has sea horses, sea lions, sea pigs, even sea apples and sea cucumbers – but it doesn’t have sea turkeys! Poor Nicker didn’t know much about Thanksgiving. His great grandfather had watched the Pilgrims come to America, but didn’t pay much attention to them. He called them “grounders,” as though anything that lived on the land was somehow not quite right.
Danny knew all about Thanksgiving. Well, that’s not quite right. He knew all about the Thanksgiving his family had. He knew that other families, in other places, did it differently – but he wasn’t quite sure how. (Maybe you can help him? Write to Danny and tell him about your Thanksgiving!)
Danny had been told that a long time ago, people came to America from Europe. (Danny knew about Europe mostly because Nicker had been there, like to visit Tess and Gracie.) Some of these people were called Pilgrims. They wanted to make a new and better life for themselves. But the new land was very different from what they knew. It wasn’t very long before they were starving.
Those native to America – usually called Indians because Columbus got lost – decided to help them. They taught the Pilgrims how to grow food. Meanwhile, they brought food so the Pilgrims wouldn’t starve. This was especially important as the harvest was ending and winter was coming.
It is said that many times, the Indians would have a big feast and shared with the Pilgrims. This became our Thanksgiving. The Pilgrims gave thanks (thanks giving) to God – and to their Indian friends. Now it is an official holiday set for the third Thursday each November.
Danny’s family always has turkey – with dressing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, gravy, corn, rutebegas, green beans, fresh baked rolls, apple pie, pumpkin pie, jello with whipped cream …
What foods and treats do you have?
Nicker didn’t know much about all those different kinds of food. He was about to find out.
And Danny’s mother was about to find out what it meant to have a curious and hungry sea dragon come to Thanksgiving dinner.
PEANUT BUTTER-BALL TURKEY
In America, the third Thirdsday … no, I mean Thursday … is Thanksgiving. Danny was excited about it. He loved the roast turkey, the dressing, the mashed potatoes, the gravy, the … well, all of it. As he told Nicker about it, Danny was already getting more and more hungry. And Nicker was getting more and more curious.
You probably remember that for Halloween Nicker dressed up as a boy – and Danny dressed up as a sea dragon. Both wanted to learn about what it was like to be the other. That often got confusing, as you can imagine.
Nicker would talk about a fish that sounded to Danny like a 1-pound fish with 5-pound eyes and worms growing out of its head. The more Nicker told Danny about the creatures deep in the ocean, the more Danny wondered if Nicker was telling him the truth or playing a joke. And the more Danny asked his Mom and Dad, the more he learned that Nicker really was telling the truth.
What a strange world it must be way down in the ocean!
But, you see, the same was true for Nicker. The world up here was as strange to him as his world would be to us. Danny would tell him of things that lived on the land. “That’s not possible!” Nicker would complain.
How would you describe a turkey to someone who had never seen one?
“It’s a bird with a big fan for a tail, a comb on its head, and a sort of comb under the chin, three skinny toes – or is it four, I forget – and claws, and it gobbles.”
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And … well, Nicker was very confused at first. How could you take all the feathers and say that you were dressing the turkey?
“No, Nicker,” Danny tried to explain. “It’s not dressing, it’s … it’s dressing!”
Nicker gave a puzzled look and asked, “So, you make a dress from old bread and put the dress on the turkey and …”
“No, Nicker, you’re not dressing the turkey, it’s dressing.”
“Oh, I see! The TURKEY is dressing itself.”
“No, Nicker, the turkey doesn’t dress. The turkey isn’t dressing, the dressing is inside.”
“So … you bring the turkey inside and let it dress there?”
“No, Nicker, it’s stuffing.”
“Yes, I know that. You told me that the turkey is gobbling. No wonder it’s stuffed.”
“No, Nicker, not stuffed, it’s dressing, and that’s the stuffing.”
“You mean that the turkey is gobbling the dresses until it is stuffed?”
Well, this went on for while. I don’t think Nicker quite understood (maybe you would like to explain it to him?), but he seemed to finally understand enough to ask if Danny’s Mom stuffed the turkey with any peanuts.
You know how Nicker gets about anything having to do with peanuts. He was quite certain that turkeys loved to eat peanuts and would stuff themselves with peanuts instead of gobbling dresses until they were stuffed. You have to admit that it does make some sort of sense. Why gobble dresses until you’re stuffed when there are perfectly good peanuts right there? (Then Nicker got concerned that the turkeys might eat all the peanuts while Nicker was dressing, and Danny told Nicker that he couldn’t be dressing because he is a sea dragon and Nicker insisted that he dressed for Halloween, and Danny was back to, “No, Nicker, not dressing, DRESSING, like stuffing,” and Nicker was right back to how the turkeys were stuffing themselves with all of the peanuts.)
Finally Danny gave up and told Nicker that he would ask his mother about peanut dressing.
Can you guess how Nicker reacted to that? The picture he got into his sea dragon brain?
“Do you mean that peanuts dress?”
I’ll leave the rest of that up to you to imagine. You can also imagine what Danny’s mother said when he suggested that they stuff the turkey with peanuts. While he was trying to explain why … Nicker had an idea of his own.
“Why would you want peanuts to stuff the turkey,” his mother asked.
“Well, Mom, I have this friend and he has never had Thanksgiving and ….”
And … Nicker slipped into the kitchen cupboard.
“Is your friend coming for Thanksgiving dinner?” she wanted to know.
“Well, not exactly. I mean, well, he’s sort of coming, but … well ….”
“Well … Nicker grabbed a jar of peanut butter and ….”
“And?” Mom asked. “What do you mean he’s coming, but only sort of? Is he coming or not?”
“Oh, he’ll be here. At least I think he will be. But, well … you see, Mom … uh, well, you won’t see.”
If you looked, though, you would see Nicker as he unscrewed the jar of peanut butter, pushed his nose inside, scooped some up, then pushed it into the turkey there on the counter.
“I don’t understand you, Danny. What do you mean that I’ll see but won’t see? Is your friend coming or not?”
Danny tried to explain about Nicker, and how grown-ups never see certain special friends, and ….
And … Nicker kept scooping peanut butter from the jar and pushing it inside the turkey until Nicker’s nose was a gooey, stickey, brown mess … and the turkey wasn’t much better. Peanut butter filled it. Stuffed it, until peanut butter was oozing back out onto the kitchen counter and was dripping onto the floor.
And right that moment, Danny’s mother was asking again about peanut stuffing, then turned and … and she SAW!
No, she didn’t see Nicker. Nicker was too fast. By the time she looked, peanut butter was pouring out of the turkey onto the floor, and Nicker was safely hidden behind a table – peanut butter pouring off his nose. (He didn’t mind. He was quite happy being well hidden, while licking his nose clean, knowing that he had stuffed the turkey properly, the way it should be stuffed.)
“MY TURKEY!” Danny’s mother said, not very calmly. “MY TURKEY!” Then she wanted to know, “How ….?”
Wouldn’t you?
A few minutes before, a beautiful, clean turkey was there. Danny asked about peanuts. He was in her sight the entire time. Then she turned and … there’s the turkey brimming with peanut butter.
“Where?” she wanted to know.
“How?” she asked.
“MY TURKEY!” she said.
She looked at it, and the mess on the counter and floor.
“My kitchen,” she sighed.
Happy Thanksgiving! (without the peanut butter)
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