For a Day of Giving Thanks

By Marylyn Cork

Over the river and through the woods . . .

The opening line of that old Thanksgiving poem pops into my head every time I think of the holiday coming up. It’s a bright spot in what is usually a pretty bleak month. My birth family and I might not have made our trips with a horse and sleigh, as in the poem, but I can remember automobile rides over snow-clogged roads, and frigid temperatures. In those early days, the destination was my grandmother’s house, just as in the poem.

Thanks to global warming, I guess, we don’t have to battle snow often these days in November. It seems to come in December now, and my sister Rachel hosts Thanksgiving dinner. She loves to cook and entertain. Every family attending brings a food dish of some kind, but it’s never actually needed. All by herself, Rachel sets a table that groans. Her late husband used to act as her chief flunky, but now she undertakes all that work on her own, even though she’s wiped out the next day.