This post is dedicated to my friend, Tammy Brocker. She always encourages me to write, especially when I don’t want too!
I’ve had a lot of great Thanksgivings in my life…and a few not so great. With the holiday coming up very soon, I was chatting with my friend about the perfect Thanksgiving, who would you invite? Fictional characters, movie stars, dead family members? The sky’s the limit…After putting some thought into this idea of the perfect Thanksgiving table, I think I would repeat a Thanksgiving of my childhood. One that seems so long ago, it feels like a dream…
I wasn’t even in school yet and my family had recently acquired a small 200 acre farm in southern Missouri. My parents decided to have both sides of the family over to our quaint little farm for Thanksgiving.
This being my fantasy Thanksgiving, what was so great about it? Well, as I’ve grown older, my huge family (I have 19 first cousins and 6 aunts and uncles on my mom’s side alone) has grown apart and, as it is with time, relatives, grandmothers, grandpas, have died. Also, there is something wonderful about childhood that you only have once, something wild and free. That Thanksgiving I had more fun playing with my cousins and running through the woods and old barn than I had eating.
In reality, I will never have that Thanksgiving back. But I think I need to appreciate the family I have now, the one that has evolved and branched off from that huge trunk that my grandparents started so long ago. The same family that was in it’s golden age that Thanksgiving at our little farm in Missouri. It’s humbling really when you think about it. How, in a matter of less than twenty years, a family that started in the same place, can change so much.
1 Comment
December 1, 2008 at 3:20 pm
Hey – Great post! This idea beats inviting famous people anyway. You’re so right, it’s all about appreciating the family (and friends) you have now. Happy Thanksgiving my friend.