Thanksgiving

[W. Gray]

Have a good Thanksgiving everyone.

Dont eat too much turkey....

[upoladeb]

Happy Thanksgiving to you also.But I didn't read your note until after dinner so I ate too much!Have a nice evening

[larryJ]

My thoughts on Thanksgiving........

Growing up I always had Thanksgiving with my Mom.....until 1966 when I was overseas.  She passed a month later.  The following six years I was invited to various Thanksgiving dinner with friends.  I started dating my wife in 1972 and we have celebrated Thanksgiving together since then along with our kids and in the last ten years with our extended family.  Sometimes we would to the beach where my son was staying or we would go to my daughter's house here in town.  Once we went to my son's condo in the mountains where I discovered that I could no longer handle the altitude.  Recently all celebrations birthdays and such have been in our house except for Christmas which is usually at my daughters.

Why do I bring this up?  This year is the first time that we have not had Thanksgiving.  Both my kids had other plans.  Because of the in-laws we always had our Thanksgiving on Friday so my daughter and son-in-law could go to his parents house on Thursday.  Anyway both of them informed us earlier in the week that they would not be around for Thanksgiving.  Not sure of my daughter's plans.  My son and his family went to San Francisco to visit his wife's family.

My wife, her cousin and I decided it wasn't just worth the effort just for the three of us. 

So for the first time in a very long time there was no Thanksgiving.

But, hey, I didn't have to shave.  Nobody had to clean house.  There was no large cooking of food.  I could watch football undisturbed.

Maybe it wasn't such a bad thing.

Larryj

[Catwoman]

LarryJ...This is the first Thanksgiving that I, too, have had to contend with the younger set having their own lives, combined with the pain of witnessing the passing of the torch, so to speak.  In a way, it's leaving a hole in my heart, a hole that I am filling with the memories of the Thanksgivings past.  No more talk of that now, as it will bring tears.  Kudos to you for finding a side to it where you can find an upside to it.  I am going to try to emulate your example. :-)   

[larryJ]

Cat, I try to be optimistic about things.  The alternative just isn't worth it. Speaking of memories of past Thanksgivings. 

In 1964 I was going to college in Colorado.  My mother had taken a teaching position on an Indian Reservation in Arizona.  One of my brothers was living in Long Beach, CA. at the time.  He wanted the two of us to come to California for Thanksgiving.  He drove to Arizona and picked up Mom and I boarded a train in Colorado for the 24 hour ride to Long Beach.  I loved that train ride.  Santa Fe RR was experimenting with using young ladies as hostesses much like a airline uses a stewardess.  I fell in love with the one on that train ride but never saw her again after that even though I went down to the train station in Colorado on a daily basis.  She was never on the train.  I also met a black man who was the steward.  So happens his last name was the same as mine and we talked a lot on that ride.  I sat in the club car with him enjoying a beer now and then.  Funny thing is once we left Colorado and went south into New Mexico there was a lapse in club car service as New Mexico was a dry state and the train could not serve alcohol while it was in the state.  Once we hit Arizona the bar was open again.

I arrived in Long Beach and had Thanksgiving with my Mom and brother.  It was then that he suggested I should transfer to a school there.  I loved the idea.  I could be closer to him and then there was all the benefits of living in SoCal.  A month later Mom came from Arizona to Colorado and I drove us to Howard for Christmas with our family there.  On the way back I decided to move to California.  She and I closed up the apartment I was living in and left for Arizona where I dropped her off and went on to Long Beach.  Two months later Mom became ill and my brother moved her to my apartment in California.  That means our last Thanksgiving together was in 1965.  I was drafted and as I said I was overseas in 1966.  Mom passed away in December that year. 

If it wasn't for that Thanksgiving I might have never though of moving to California.  So there you go.

A great memory.  So Cat think about all the fun times like this one and don't fret about not having a Thanksgiving without family.  Like they say in sports......"There's always next year."

Larryj

[Catwoman]

<3  Thank you for your kind words. :-) 

[larryJ]

Or I should say "there's always next week"!  Over the years we have celebrated holidays and birthdays when it was convenient for everyone.  For example, if a birthday fell on a weekday, that person would be called and wished a happy birthday and there would be a birthday party on either the preceding weekend or the following weekend.  In the case of my birthday along with my daughter, granddaughter and grandson all having a birthday in the same week in August we just have one big party sometime during one of the weekends around that time.

What does this have to do with Thanksgiving you ask? And you should.

My son called his mom last night and suggested that we have Thanksgiving this Saturday.

Great.......

Larryj

[Dignified Redneck]

Larry,

This is your Kansas cousin, Deb Garison. I always get a grin from your posts. When your son called his mom, did he suggest bringing most of the food or do you all get that priviledge? Sorry you have to shave. 
I always tried to be considerate of my families and holidays when I had both sets of parents. Carl's mom always invited Bill to share the holiday meals with us (which helped a lot). Now that I am the in law (or outlaw, depending on the day), I try to be understanding of sharing my son and his family. I borrowed an idea from a co-worker and friend and have started having what I call Thanksmas for extended family. We do a gift exchange by number and buy for the children. Then we play cards or board games. The menu changes from year to year. It sure takes a lot of the holiday stress away and we just enjoy the day. Hope your holidays are "bear"able and lots of memories are made. Love from Kansas, Deb. 

[larryJ]

Hi, Deb, nice to hear from you.  In answer to your statement about food my wife informed me about an hour ago that they will be bringing the food.  Yippee! 

Speaking of shaving or not shaving..........In 1960 when Kansas was celebrating 100 years of Statehood Bill Redmond grew a huge beard and wore a bowler hat to the family reunion that year which was held at the park in Howard.  I thought that was so cool!  But hey he was a cool dude!

Larryj

[larryJ]

A follow up on Thanksgiving........true to their word my son and daughter-in-law brought all the food.  My son has one of those deep fat turkey fryers and did the turkey in that.  My wonderful daughter-in-law made sure that everything was gluten free for me.  We had a nice meal and a wonderful time just sitting around and talking.  Then my nine year old and my seven year old granddaughters told us that there was going to be a show.  They passed out play money to all of us to buy tickets and then later brought around some tickets which we paid for with our money.  Then they came out and put up about three or four sheets of paper on the wall with pictures they drew of a tree and Santa, etc.  Then they came back into the room and holding an Ipad they began to sing Christmas carols.  My four year old grandson sat on the floor in front of them holding another sheet of paper that said Ho Ho Ho.  I don't know if this was something that my daughter-in-law might have suggested to her daughter prior to them coming here but it was pretty neat anyhow.

Next will be my oldest granddaughter's 13th birthday on the 10th.  She has been saving her money and bought herself a cell phone.  Now us older folks would say "what does a 13 year old need a phone for?'  That is "old school" as they say nowadays.  It is nice that she has a cell phone so that she can inform whoever is picking her up from school if she has an event to go to after school or if she needs to come home for whatever reason.  Part of the day of our Thanksgiving my son was tormenting her by sending her text messages while they were sitting in the same room.  They were both laughing and they finally admitted they were texting each other.  Such fun.

Time for my second cup........

Larryj