Beech Tree News Network

It was that kind of Thanksgiving—the kind that can happen only in Alabama with Garey’s family.  There are too many dogs and too many people gathered together under one roof—Garey’s sister, Charlotte’s, roof—but we are all welcome and all happy to be under this particular roof. 
It is the kind of Thanksgiving where the grandchild drops the lemon icebox pie onto the carpet, and the first dog on the scene is, of course, the one with the delicate constitution (hence on a special diet), which means the dog has to be scooped up and carried away from the lemon icebox pie, which has to be scooped up and thrown away, as the granddaughter is scooped up and seated at the bar in the kitchen that holds a new piece of pie, instead of being served at the previously un-thought-out site in the living room, on the coffee table.
It is the kind of Thanksgiving with traditional foods, like Aggie’s cornbread dressing and pecan pie, and nontraditional foods, like Charlotte’s squash casserole and her son, Jason’s, deep-fried turkey, injected with creole sauce. 
It is the kind of Thanksgiving during which the preparers of the food talk about diets, and weight lost and weight gained, and after-holiday-doing-better plans, and Nutri System, and exercise, while they are preparing the food.  This kind of talk always makes me hungry, so I have another slice of chocolate chip cake then dig through the cooler of drinks for anything that doesn’t have “diet” as part of the name.  Aggie tells me I’m going to ruin my appetite.  I stare at her blankly, wondering how she could know me for 39 years and still believe anything could ruin my appetite.
It is the kind of Thanksgiving that invites political opinions and nay-saying and Monday morning quarterbacking.  “He has ruined the health care system,” someone says.  “He has ruined the whole country,” says another.  “It is just a fulfillment of Biblical prophecy,” someone else offers, “It’s obvious we’re living in the last days.”
I want to say, “My Grandma Stone said people told her she was living in the last days when she was a little girl, and she was ninety when she died, and has been dead for fifteen years.”  But I don’t.  I smile and butter another roll, while telling myself I’m being tolerant of other people’s opinions, but you know and I know I’m just being a coward.
It is the kind of Thanksgiving where the cousins, Natalie, Nikki, Jason and Brad, line up on the sofa so everyone can get pictures with their smart phones.  The picture looks just like the one taken the year before in the same location.  This makes me happy, because there is so little consistency in my life.
It is the kind of Thanksgiving where Charlotte tells Aggie that she wants to put the dishes in the dishwasher and Aggie insists on hand-washing them.  This does not sit well with Charlotte, so I choose to back away from the conflict, having been on Charlotte’s bad side before, and never wanting to be there again; but Aggie has always dared to go where angels fear to tread.
It is the kind of Thanksgiving where Nikki and her dogs and Natalie and her three-year-old have had all they can take by Saturday morning, so they head to their homes in New Orleans and Morgantown, respectively. 
As I watch them drive away, I tell myself that I can go shopping or read or browse the internet or watch TV or do any one of a hundred things I can’t ordinarily do without being interrupted.  I take a nap instead, because it’s that kind of Thanksgiving.