Thanks-giving

“In November, people are good to each other. They carry pies to each other’s homes and talk by crackling woodstoves, sipping mellow cider. They travel very far on a special November day just to share a meal with one another
and to give thanks for their many blessings.”
— American author Cynthia Rylant (1954-)

And so it will be next week Thursday. Well, sort of.
Indeed, I’ll be on the road traveling far afield several hours for Thanksgiving dinner with family, bearing a homemade pie. While there won’t be a crackling woodstove or likely even the sipping of mellow cider — chilled Welch’s white grape juice in a champagne-inspired bottle doesn’t qualify in my book — there will be a bountiful feast of all the usual favorite Thanksgiving foods, prayers of thanks-giving around the table for the many blessings of this past year, and heaping helpings of nostalgia as we recount family stories of Thanksgivings past.

As 2024 winds down to the year-ending trifecta of the Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s holiday gatherings, the Thanksgiving national holiday is a time for both remembering the past and also cherishing new memories being made in the present.
I recently ran across old art and photos from my children’s days as students at North Lakeland Elementary School in Manitowish Waters, a nostalgic treasure trove of hand-silhouette “turkeys,” construction paper buckle-hatted Plymouth Colony pilgrims, and snapshot memories of the second grade “Tom Turkey” play, all reflecting a childhood remarkably similar to my own Kodachrome Thanksgiving memories of growing up on Milwaukee’s far northwest side more than half a century ago.
Sifting through the memories, I’m again reminded of the simple pleasures that made — and make — the Thanksgiving holiday special.
While the cornucopia meal — roast turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, stuffing, green bean casserole, cranberry sauce and homemade pies, bookended by the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and football on TV — was the focal point of the day, the nostalgic memories that endure are of the family and friends that have gathered around the festive holiday meal over the decades and across the generations, including long-lost but not forgotten loved ones that live on in the memories and stories that continue to endure around the holiday table.
And the meal, both then and now, is inextricably interwoven with the act of giving thanks for the many blessings bestowed upon those gathered for the Thanksgiving feast, taking a much-needed “time out” from the hustle-and-bustle busyness of our regular lives to pause, reflect and pray.
And there is so much to be thankful for beyond the meal set before us. The blessing of family and friends, employment, home and hearth, health, and even life itself.
Nobody is guaranteed tomorrow, a reality brought home to me in September by a gangrenous burst appendix that nearly cost me my life, and an October infection abscess complication that nearly did the same.
By the grace of God, I am still here, surrounded by family and friends, to give thanks for life’s many blessings, both large and small.
Praise the Lord — and pass the pumpkin pie.
Eric Johnson can be reached at eric@fyinorthwoods.com.