Happy Thanksgiving!

Family and Thanksgiving. Hmm… do those two really mix? I think they do, but our family has had reasons to question it.

My first Thanksgiving with my married-into-family was fantastic. My now sisters-in-law were welcoming, and though they were ten to twenty years older than me, they welcomed me into the family as one of their own – even if I refused to eat oyster dressing. After our first Christmas fiasco (fodder for another blog – or therapy – it’s a toss-up), I declared that Thanksgiving would be with the in-laws so that I could have Christmas with my family,

So, for 39 years, I have gathered with the Templins for Thanksgiving. The time together has been great, but you can’t have family gather without some sort of chaos. Can I get an “amen,” or at least a virtual high-five?

There was the year the baby and I ended up in the ER.

There were many years when the toilet backed up before my sister-in-law enacted the “3 square rule.” What the heck is the “3 square rule?” Well, we didn’t have a lot of money, so I bought “economy” toilet paper – AKA thin toilet paper. My sister-in-law was much older than us and, therefore, could afford to buy the expensive TP–Charmin. My toddler girls used the normal wad of cheap TP, but the super thick, quality TP clogged the pipes. Toilets backed up. Toilets overflowing. Towels thrown down. Lots of plunging. Therefore, the “3 square rule” was established. Apparently, a wad of cheap TP equals 3 squares of Charmin.

There was the year of the raw turkey. My sister-in-law put the beautiful bird in the oven at the scheduled time. A few hours later, after we had filled up on coffee and the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, we realized we should’ve been smelling the turkey and…nada. We ran to the kitchen to discover my sister-in-law’s new-fangled oven had unknowingly been turned off!!! We didn’t know how long it had been turned off – and it was stuffed with OYSTER dressing. It was almost like a funeral possession as we marched the 22-pound bird to the trash after an emergent call to Butterball. (Did you know there is a Thanksgiving Day Butterball hotline?)  After the trashing of the bird, tears shed, and assurances that no one was to blame, we bought a turkey dinner from a grocery store. We thought the dinner had been saved until…we found out the turkey dinner was frozen!! So, we had microwaved turkey that year!

Then there was the year my Cocker Spaniel was caught standing on the dessert table licking the pecan pie – which we put under the broiler and called it “good.” Very few ate pecan pie that year.

And the year a June bug got stuck between some switch in the AC unit and fried itself AND the connection. If you aren’t familiar with Thanksgiving in the South, you should know that AC is as important as cornbread dressing! So, we overpaid an AC guy to come out and flick a fried June bug off a switch to give us much-needed AC.

And, lastly (well, lastly to date. Stay tuned for more Templin Turkey Day Tomes), there was what we refer to as the Turkey Flood year. My husband was trying to defrost the turkeys and put them in the laundry room sink with water gently flowing over them. To this day, I’m not sure what happened, but the sink overflowed, and raw turkey water flooded the house!! We jumped into action. We mopped. We squeegeed. We pulled appliances off the wall. We pulled up the carpet. We sweated. We laughed and we cried. And we laughed some more!

Isn’t that the picture of Thanksgiving? A crisis. Then, pulling together to overcome? That is what the first people to set foot on American soil did. They weathered much greater disasters and threats than mine caused by too much TP, a fried June bug, or even a Turkey Flood. After surviving the treacherous trip across the ocean and months of struggling to survive, the Pilgrims gathered with Native Americans to enjoy a feast from their harvest. Grateful they had survived.

As I listen to the wind rustle the turning leaves, I think of the things and people I am grateful for. The list is long, as I am very blessed. Blessed to have people I love and people who love me.

I trust and pray you have a very blessed and Happy Thanksgiving. And, remember, should a crisis arise that causes chaos, you can choose to chuckle. Chuckle in the chaos.