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Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Thanksgiving QUESTIONS


1. What has been your Thanksgiving tradition? Do you travel? Do people travel to see you? approximately how many people are present?
2. How do you feel about Thanksgiving? Stressed about cleaning or the "perfect" turkey?
3. Do you think having a holiday denoting thanks is a good idea, or are you of the school that we should be thankful ALL the time?
4. what are you most thankful for right now?

For the past decade Thanksgiving has usually meant going to my parents-in-law's house 75 minutes away. It's them, us, a couple cousins, and sometimes a neighbor or two. Interesting how it has evolved since I first went to my not yet in-law's house in 1994, when all four of the adult children always came home to see Mom & Dad. One is now deceased and the others are married with children with one having far distance to travel.

Thanksgiving used to be the most stressful time of the year. Between 1974 and 1993, I probably was at at least 17 different venues. Thanksgiving tended to magnify the unsettledness of my life.

Of course we should always be thankful. And of course we ae not. A day designed to do that doesn't seem like a terrible idea.

I'm most grateful that I no longer have a gypsy existence on the fourth Thursday in November. Oh yeah, and my wife and my child and my friends and my family and my job...



Pictures from Life.com:

President Dwight D. Eisenhower carving the Thanksgiving turkey while Mamie, John & the rest of the family are cheerfully looking on.
Date taken: November 1953
Photographer: George Skadding

FDR At Thanksgiving
Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt w. his wife Eleanor, serving Thanksgiving turkey to polio patients who drew lots to see who would sit at the Pres.'s table in Georgia Hall at Warm Springs Foundation.
Location: Warm Springs, GA, US
Date taken: November 1938
Photographer: Margaret Bourke-White

Danny Kaye
Thanksgiving Parade
Photographer: Yale Joel

Children eating Thanksgiving dinner at the Great Britain headquarters.
Location: United Kingdom
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: David E. Scherman

ROG

3 comments:

Scott said...

1. No traditions. Used to always go to my paternal grandparents, even after they moved. But as they got older, and as I have moved around, so has the place I have celebrated at. Twice, while on-site for work (back in my automotive days), I had Thanksgiving dinner with a friend and their family, not having time to drive home. Usually car plants are shutdown for the holiday and it's the perfect time to get in and replace equipment.

2. I never have felt stressed, other then the one time my ex-wife and I hosted Thanksgiving. And that was mostly due to us not being coffee drinkers and having a coffee maker that could only handle four cups at a time. Meanwhile we had nearly a dozen coffee drinkers in attendance.

3. Both. I think it's a good thing to make a specific day, but yes, we should always be thankful for what we have everyday.

4. My family and Marcia's family. They have been rather generous with helping and understanding our position of both being unemployed since the early summer.

Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family Roger!

Pat said...

Hi, Roger, and thanks for pointing out that the ABC Wednesday link didn't work---trouble is, you can never fix it then...I must be // and : challenged; something went awry.

But I love Thanksgiving, though I can't celebrate today because I work (no holiday here), so I will have 8 people over on Saturday for a low-stress meal. I make corn pudding, stuffing, gravy, and may do a mushroom risootto this year along with The Turkey. And I am thankful for many things, as I wrote on my blog.

Nukke said...

Lovely old Thanksgiving pics ! And he was Danny Key as I thought :)