It’s Thursday, November 28. My immediate family, several grandparents, and a jolly bunch of cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, and friends have all convened under one roof for Thanksgiving dinner, and the house is filled with laughter and light. Outside, it’s snailing, which does not mean that gastropods are descending from the sky, but rather that there is heavy precipitation and it’s like the disappointing child of snow and hail. The sun is practically below the horizon, and the sky is streaked with vermilion and purple. Deep gray clouds thickly populate the upper troposphere, depositing wet, grimy snailstones on the unsuspecting people below.
Inside the house, clusters of family members are interspersed between assorted pets, who are dashing around in a state of frenzied excitement. The furniture is an eclectic mix of ancient, musty sofas and intricately decorated wooden cabinets, gleaming modern coffee tables and creaky rocking chairs, repurposed church pews and sixties-style bar stools. Toys from innumerable different childhoods are piled in every nook and cranny. Objects both new and old, representing over half a century of life, crowd every shelf. Enticing smells waft from the kitchen, while the foyer smells of cat litter, and the living room evokes a crackling campfire for anyone with a functional nose.
Now the feast is finally ready, and my family begins the arduous task of finding room for everyone at the table. When everyone’s squeezed in, we survey the exquisite banquet that lies in front of us. It took over a day’s work to procure and produce this glorious feast, and it is certainly a sight to behold.
There are mountains of roasted root vegetables and fluffy mashed potatoes as far as the eye can see. There are endless iterations of the obligatory Thanksgiving stuffing to accommodate everyone’s insane dietary restrictions. There are lakes and ponds and rivers of gravy, and there’s a bowl of cranberry sauce big enough for my smallest cousins to have a relaxing swim in it, should they be so inclined. There are pecan pies and sweet potato pies and pumpkin pies and chocolate cream pies, and enough ice cream to satiate an entire group of theater kids fresh off their opening night. There are also the slightly more unconventional desserts, like cold, slimy, chia pudding, homemade banana-cacao cupcakes with avocado-based frosting, and a heavenly Pavlova, baked to crispy perfection and piled high with fresh, luscious berries.
All this, however, pales in comparison to the centerpiece. While most families carve up a juicy turkey, or in some cases a soy-based substitute, we have something better. What completes my family’s Thanksgiving dinner is not poultry, nor is it anything else traditionally consumed across America or Canada. Nor, for that matter, is it anything conventionally eaten in Africa, Asia, Antarctica, Australia, Central or South America, Europe, or in any of the world’s island nations. I know for a fact that my family is the only family in the world with this on our table, because our centerpiece is truly unique. It’s incomparable, unreplicated, irreplaceable.
It’s Timothée Chalamet.
That’s right, Timothée Chalamet is in the middle of our Thanksgiving table. He’s posing elegantly, as still as a perfectly sculpted marble statue. He is clad in a pristine Roman toga, and a juicy bunch of grapes hang delicately from his slender hand. His ebony curls perfectly contrast with his creamy alabaster skin, and his green eyes glisten like succulent olives, ripened to perfection under the Tuscan sun. Although his coral-pink lips softly curve upward, his jawline looks rigid and sharp enough to carve up a turkey. Timothée Chalamet is an almost supernaturally exquisite human being.
Ever so slowly, he begins to move, to break his solemn posture. Timothée gradually raises himself to a standing position. Suddenly, without hesitation, he breaks into a festive jig, and within seconds, every single being in the room, human, animal, and plant, is grinning with maniacal glee. The joy that Timothée Chalamet brings to my family each Thanksgiving is unparalleled. After his twenty-minute dance medley, he thanks his audience and proceeds to crowd surf, relaxing atop our hands as if he’s relaxing on a beach in Positano, basking in the late afternoon sun as the crystal-clear turquoise waves lap gently at the shore.
It’s still Thursday, November 28. As the sky darkens, Timothée Chalamet regales everyone with fabulous stories, impressions, improvisations, and various interpretive dances. He even performs a one-man version of the musical The Phantom of the Opera for all of us to enjoy. There is truly no limit to the joy Timothée Chalamet brings us each and every year. None of us have any idea why he consistently shows up here, but we love and appreciate him regardless.