I just wanted to take time to wish everybody a Happy Thanksgiving.
But I need something.
I need us all to remember that not everyone will have a full table. Some won’t have any table.
And I need us to remember that full tables aren’t guaranteed in future gatherings.
Even though the holidays can be stressful, the ability to connect with family is vital. I hope we are all able to enjoy the time with our loved ones. In the end all of it, the travel, the TSA lines, the expense, is all for the family. I think of the times my grandpa and I left the table, bellies stuffed, to watch football and count the seconds until we “had room for pie.” As a kid, it always seemed like he would be there forever.
Then one day, cancer took my best friend. I still watch football sometimes, especially on Thanksgiving. I still eat pie. I still do all the same things I did with him, but it is lonelier now. He has been gone nearly thirty-five years, and coincidentally, my childhood ended the day he died. Maybe somebody reads this in a miserable security line, or standing in the cold waiting for an Uber. Maybe they are frustrated. I get it. Maybe it doesn’t seem worth it.
But as the participants shrink over the years, and the dinners get smaller, and the noise gets lower, and the laughter fades, please don’t let it be the surly flight attendant or cranky baggage clerk that colors your memory of the season, for they most likely have family they miss too.
If I could hug my family now passed on one last time, I would wait in the rental car line. If I could hear them gracefully ask me about the quality of my trip, I would only have two words for them, “worth it.”
And if I could tell my inner ten-year old one thing, it would be this: There will be times this will get hard. You will be cold. You will be tired. You will have lost bags, or sat in traffic. It might not seem like those holidays are the happiest days in your life.
But for the people that love us, that open the pumpkin scented garage and reach out to embrace us, for them, it might be the happiest days..
in theirs.
Happy Thanksgiving and love to all of you!
-ROC
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-ROC
