Thanksgiving reflections on this morning’s coffee walk: 27 years ago, I was a very green college grad struggling in my first “real” job at a management consultancy in Silicon Valley. I just didn’t fit in with my ladder-climbing, MBA-worshipping peers and it was making me miserable since I hadn’t yet been able to imagine a Plan B. So when a few of the one- and two-year associates invited me to carpool with them to the holiday party at the house of one of the managers, I was thrilled to be included.

I made an early misstep when I wasn’t sure how to open the door to Steve’s strangely hulking vehicle; it was 1993 and SUVs were a new thing, so I had insulted him by trying to pull backwards on the handle like a minivan. “It’s for SURFING, not for KIDS,” he informed me frostily.

But Joanna seemed to be taking me under her wing, which I was so grateful for. She was Cool, with her close-cropped hair and proto-hipster style. I appreciated her talking to me occasionally on the stop-and-go drive up 101 to Daly City and then the long wide streets carved into curves along the flanks of the hills, lined with postwar bungalows that had long ago ceased to be identical as two or three generations gardened and painted and added on to suit their families and their cultures.

I tried not to be a pest during the party, nibbling on Cheez-Its and sipping my wine in a plastic glass and smiling as I stood on the fringes of conversational groupings. Finally everyone agreed it was time to head back — I think they had work to finish up, it was that kind of hard-charging place.

As we climbed back into the don’t-call-it-a-van, Joanna asked me casually what I thought of the neighborhood. “It’s adorable!” I said enthusiastically. The cozy little houses with their front yards and brick chimneys and car-filled driveways felt like a California cousin to my east-coast childhood home.

She swept me a disappointed look, and I knew I’d given the wrong answer. She never had time for me again after that. I wasn’t Cool. I was Surburban. Bourgeois. Boring.

Flash forward thirteen years that felt like a lifetime’s worth of growing up, and John and I were moving to Orange County for his job. Our realtor kept showing us raw, newly built subdivisions; looking back, I was being too gentle about my objections to the us-vs-them, barbararians-at-the-gates ethos of gated communities. Finally he said, doubtfully, “Well, would you be comfortable living near Santa Ana? Not IN it, of course.” We were too new to the area to understand the coded racism of the question, so we just said, “Um, sure?” and he took us to this neighborhood that would become our home.

Wide tree-lined streets and flowery yards. A 3-bed-2-bath ranch house on a slab, with an open-circle design inside so you walk from the kitchen into the dining nook into the living room into the family room back into the kitchen. Just like the house I grew up in. Just like home. My heart sang.

And flash forward again fourteen years to today, making me far more than twice the age I was when I went to that stupid party that’s stuck in my mind for all this time. My feelings about the suburbs in general, and this one in particular, have gotten more complicated as I have belatedly learned about the history of redlining and zoning restrictions and have started to recognize this as land stolen from the Tongva and Kizh people, while at the same time I’ve seen my neighbors proudly hanging up Trump flags. And I know not everyone wants this particular American Dream (cough cough Joanna cough cough).

But yeah, I am Suburban. And I’m filled with gratitude to be here, in this year when home life is everything. Kitchen drawers with all the spatulas I’ll ever need and a fridge stuffed with ingredients for the holiday ahead. My lovely little IKEA- and sunshine-filled office space. Yoga mats in the garage, just the same as where my parents kept the ping-pong table.

I don’t exactly know why I just wrote this love letter to the suburbs. Getting an early start on counting my blessings for Thanksgiving, I guess. And in doing that, trying to wish you this same peaceful, homey feeling. Whatever that looks like to you.

❤ to all.