“Cooking is for people who can stay in the zone.”

My husband Hank told me that recently. Admittedly, it is a clever statement, but it hurt my feelings a bit. I withheld responding that, if I “stayed in the zone,” there would rarely be a load of laundry done, a floor vacuumed, a bathroom cleaned, or an email answered . . . at least not by me!

On the other hand, it is good advice dispensed by a master of “staying in the zone.” Were he not that master, there would be no Professor-Carol endeavor. The endless technological, logistical, and editorial work behind the scenes lies largely in Hank’s hands. How anyone can sit and focus so long baffles me. Still, what would you expect from someone with a Ph.D. in music theory and a law degree, if not masterful ability to stay focused?

As an illustration of what happens when someone loses the zone while cooking, let me offer my effort recently to make a first butternut-squash soup. The recipe resembled a superb one for potato soup that I extracted years ago from a traditional German cookbook. That one has several mechanical steps, abounds in ingredients like leeks, celery root, garlic, and crème fraiche, and never fails. So how hard could this new recipe be?

I’ll tell you how hard: it was a debacle. But I learned the following (one should learn from each debacle). First, there’s a reason why people buy butternut squash already cut up in oblong plastic boxes. I will never again snub up my nose when a fellow shopper reaches for that container.

Second, when the recipe says “roast the cubes 40 minutes at 425˚ turning once,” it omitted a critical factor: the whole shebang may begin to burn after 25 minutes so you’d better pay attention (and no, my oven thermostat was not off, although my cube-size probably was).

Third, the instruction to push the soft mush through a sieve was a joke. (Method Two for those who last owned a food processor in the 1980s.) Ha, I can as easily push the leg of my dining-room chair through a sieve. It won’t result in cream soup.

Fourth, half-way through a recipe that isn’t working out, just quit. Quit, dump it, or give it to the dog. It cannot be redeemed. Okay, that is bad advice. A good cook will get creative, figure it out, and fix the problem. But my advice is more practical.

Now, I did not say “Fifth, go buy a can of butternut-squash soup,” did I? As General MacArthur allegedly said, “I will return.” Maybe one of you can send me a truly fail-proof recipe for butternut-squash soup, preferably one that dispenses with roasting cubes or the pushing through sieves. I need one that can be made without paying much attention.

Many of us will be cooking a lot across the next week. Thanksgiving Dinner happens to be my favorite meal to prepare. Despite my penchant for distraction, the menu turns out rather well. Could it be that, unawares, I focus on it (stay in the zone, so to speak)? Nah, perish the thought.

Yet it is easy to focus on Thanksgiving. It is a holiday to love. Thanksgiving has kept most of its traditional integrity (despite the unconscionable fact that more and more stores are opening that day). Thanksgiving beckons us with its quiet imagery of hearth and home, despite the shameless horror of a thing called “Black Friday” tearing at its edges—a charmless thing that never should exist.

Beyond that, Thanksgiving provides an opportunity to drag out, if you will, items that otherwise live in the back of your drawers and cabinets, from pilgrim figurines to grandma’s soup tureen to candlesticks and fancy vases. It gives us a chance to relate oral history about these items, and if you don’t have any oral history, you can speculate (a.k.a. make it up!). Admittedly, it’s a busy time with cleaning, cooking, fetching kids from college, and preparing the beds for visitors. The adults in charge do not have an easy time. But somehow such labor at Thanksgiving seems pleasanter to me than at other times of the year.

Finally, Thanksgiving offers us a clear avenue for passing down the best traditions we ourselves inherited. If we inherited little, we find an open invitation to create new ones. Most wonderfully, it does not matter if the family Thanksgiving tradition involves making s’mores in lieu of pumpkin pie, or choosing to gather ingredients for a quick pizza rather than basting the turkey. What matters is the anticipation, the participation, the continuity, and the strong declaration of this day as a fine time to remember, reflect, and, yes, give thanks.

For these are the three actions so desperately needed in our world. These actions are not dependent on money, goods, or process. They cannot be stripped from us by even the ugliest news or the crassest behaviors. Whatever energy it takes to remember, reflect, and give thanks returns four-fold as a blessing. These are the actions that create the real zone—one that holds us tightly and cannot be fractured.

As we “Gather Together” in the next days, no matter who or where, let us relish and enjoy one of our grandest American traditions. May each of us continue to build and sustain this tradition through welcoming hands, giving hearts, and yes, where needed, the mostly cheerful scouring of pots and checking of oven timers!