“These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God, with shouts of joy and thanksgiving among the festive throng” (Psalm 42:4 NIV).
For most of my life Thanksgiving Day has been a place to go. Until I was a married man we drove into the Virginia hills to my maternal grandparents home.
They had a 70 acre farm deep in the Appalachians with forested mountains standing like sentinels overlooking their property. They lived in a home built by my grandmother’s father nearly a century ago. The land was farmed by my grandfather, who also drove a school bus on the side. I can still see the barns and sheds that sat behind the house with a yellow school bus parked out front.
The long drive on a dusty, gravel road (A sign used to read: “End of State Maintenance”) only added to the anticipation of being at Granny and Papaws house for Thanksgiving. Uncles, aunts, and cousins would be there. Chaotic laughter and scents of cooking wafted from Granny’s kitchen as the women-folk gathered and busied themselves with dinner preparations. The men-folk sat on the front porch discussing politics and sports while watching the kids play. Papaw would punctuate the occasional story with a spit of tobacco juice across the porch railing. The men would respond with raucous laughter and beg him for another tale.
Remembering that they were supposed to be watching us, one of the men-folk would yell, “Stay out of the creek kids!”
Usually too late for me. I invariably fell in while trying to catch a crawdad. Causing my mother to fuss about muddy clothes and my Granny to come to my aid saying, “He’s a boy. Let him play.”
After I was married, the Thanksgiving tradition switched to another place to go. We started traveling up into the Blue Ridge mountains to my wife’s family home. Going there wasn’t unfamiliar. They had the mountains and curvy, country roads. They had the festive food and the chaotic laughter. They even had a place for me and my boys to play and shoot guns and cause the women-folk to fuss about our muddy clothes. My kids even called Robin’s father “Papaw” and so did I.
This year the place has changed. With the passing of Robin’s dad in 2008 and the birth of our first grandchild in 2009, apparently, I’m the new “Papaw.” So, we’re having Thanksgiving at home. We’re giving our kids and grandson a place to go… our house.
We don’t have a creek to play in or mountain to climb, we probably shouldn’t shoot guns in the city limits, but I bet if we try, we can still get muddy playing in our yard…
…and give the women-folk something to fuss about.
I love the post, and the pic was great. But my memory of Thanksgiving, was Granny and Papaw at our house. Granny at the end of the kitchen table cutting and preping all the veggies, and Mom getting the turkey, and gravey together. The house being full of all our people, starting from about noon, until late evening. Of course, “Cowboy” football.
Phil & I spent our first Thanksgiving spending the night at Granny & Papaw’s and helping with the big meal.You’ll have to get Phil to tell you about sleeping in the room next to Uncle George’s.