Our menu is planned and the table is partially set in my mind until it’s time for us to really put everything in place. The foods spread before us will be exceptionally abundant compared to ‘just the usual abundance’ we take for granted many days. On this Thanksgiving holiday as we sit around our table, my dad – head bowed – will be waiting, as always, for his chattering, irreverent clan to pause for prayer before we eat.
Most days we eat around different schedules without stopping to pray a thanks for our food, and I wonder if what I feel in my conscious depths conveys enough love and gratitude to God for allowing me to be so warm, well-fed and comfortable. There is nothing like praying our thanks together. That is part of what this holiday will do for me. I hope it touches each of us.
With a lighter holiday tone, let’s all enjoy the following poem by Mariane Holbrook, writer and columnist for the Island Gazette in Carolina Beach, North Carolina.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING
“Tis the night before Thanksgiving, … all through our house
No turkey is baking; I feel like a louse,
For I am all nestled, so snug in my bed;
I’m not gettin’ up and I’m not bakin’ bread.
No pie’s in my oven, no cranberry sauce
‘Cuz I give the orders, and I am the boss.
When out in the kitchen, there arose such a clatter
I almost got up to see what was the matter.
As I drew in my head and was tossing around
To the bed came my husband, he grimaced, he frowned.
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
He scared me to death and I thought, “Here he goes!”
He spoke not a word as he threw back my quilt
And the look that he gave was intended to wilt.
[Then] up to the ceiling my pillows he threw.
I knew I had had it, his face had turned blue.
“You prancer, you dodger, you’re lazy, you vixen!
Out yonder in kitchen, Thanksgiving you’re fixin’.”
But he heard me explain, with my face in a pout:
“I’m JUST TOO DARN TIRED and we’re EATIN’ OUT!”
