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<\/a> I chose not to have children, mainly because I’m still waiting to grow up myself! (And<\/em> I didn’t want to share my crayons. And I’m not even kidding about that.\u00a0 Good mother material, eh?) And I’ve never second-guessed\u00a0that decision. There’s actually only one day a year that I wish I had a child for a few hours. Can you guess when that is? No, it’s not Mother’s Day. (You thought I was all about getting gifts, didn’t you?)<\/p>\nIt’s Thanksgiving, but only the morning of. That’s not because it’s a family holiday, though\u2014it’s solely because I need someone to watch the parade with!!! Mr. X is really not interested. I used to force Clarence to watch with me, but he really did not seem to care at all about the Broadway numbers. (Since he was the famous Singing Dog, though, he did<\/em> sing along with the songs the famous-peeps-on-floats sang later on.)<\/p>\n Here’s one little story about that day, that I get a kick out of. I was rarely home in New York with my family for Thanksgiving after I moved to Los Angeles as a teen-ager. I had even lived in Rhode Island for a few years, but always stayed there for that holiday, as well, because my second family, the Hazels, cooked better than my Salkin clan!<\/p>\n So, one year, I decided to go home from LA for Turkey Day because my mother always missed me. I had spent a couple of days in Manhattan with my friends before returning to Brooklyn the night before so that my mother would have someone to watch the parade with, because that wasn’t really my father’s thing.<\/p>\n It sounds like an easy thing to do, but it was not. For years, I had been hearing about the wonderful \u201cnight before\u201d fete at my friend Amy’s apartment. It was right across from the museum where they blew-up all the balloons for the parade, and, knowing these hosts like I did, I knew it would be a fun and elegant affair. I had always<\/em> wanted to attend, but was never in that town then.<\/p>\n So, finally, here was my one chance. I was already staying with them, and Amy and her game husband, Freddie, were begging me to stay. But, no\u2014being the thoughtful daughter that I always was, I would be there for my little mo on Thanksgiving morning, to get up bright and early and watch the parade with her! I just knew how happy that would make her, and doing that was always my mission in life.<\/p>\n