A Thanksgiving Story (love you, Mom)

So here’s my all time favorite Thanksgiving story…

When Mom and Dad were first married, Mom took great pride in preparing holiday meals. Dad’s only complaint was that she burned the onions when she made stuffing for turkey.  Losing his patience, he finally asked her why she always burned the onions. Mom said that was the way her mother had always done it.

So next time Dad got to see Grandmom, he asked her about it.  “Mrs. B, Agnes says she leared to burn the onions from you – why do you think you have to burn the onions?”  I can imagine Grandmom smiling her twinkly smile when she gave the answer that always makes me laugh… “I don’t do it on purpose; with six kids running around the house, it just seems to always turn out that way.”

Be careful what you pass on to your children!

Thanksgiving is a wonderful tradition and was always my favorite holiday growing up.  Always etched in my mind is the entire Balzer clan sitting down to multiple tables, multiple china patterns, and huge amounts of food.  With Grandad at the head of the table and the littlest ones at the foot, with Uncle Mike’s pies waiting patiently on the sideboard, with all the aunts, uncles, cousins, and invited friends, we were quite the gathering. Later, Daddy and MaryAnn moved the feast to their basement and those events were happy times as well as my generation started bringing along kids of their own.

I overlook the days of prep, the too-noisy house, the missing people, the impossible cooking schedule, the not-really-so-memorable meal, and the after-dinner snoring nappers, and instead revel in the quiet joy of gathering family and friends around a table just to say thanks for our many blessings. 

“If the only prayer you said in your whole life was “thank you,” that would suffice.”  — Meister Eckhart

Happy Thanksgiving!