Today I am getting off a plane on the west coast, eager to spend Thanksgiving with my daughter’s family. Although I visit often, it’s been years since the whole family has been together.
We are in an alpine area, where snowcapped peaks rise above the evergreens. Everyone’s wearing matching plaids for a family picture. At least one image will be on a Christmas card this year.
There are scrumptious smells coming from the kitchen. While we enjoy our holiday feast, furry bandits are busy raiding the garbage cans. All the pretty decorations and snacks are in shreds. There is a reason the sign says, DO NOT FEED THE WILDLIFE. Aggravated with chasing them away, my daughter said, “This place is full of varmints.”
I thought, it’s not the first holiday we had unwelcomed guests. This garbage just adds a little charm to the photo.
My life began in Iuka, Mississippi. On our front porch, I heard quite a few stories and they usually began with, “when I was a little girl…”
In 1950, the family of Paul Osborn gathered for Thanksgiving at Hubbard Salem. Aunt Annie was coming. She was more than a sister to Paul. Their mother had died of typhoid fever when he was just 18 months old. Annie took care of her brothers and sisters until they were grown. She did not marry until she was in her thirties.
All the kids were excited. They remembered egg custards, candied sweet potatoes, and butter rolls with nutmeg. She was a good cook. Aunt Eunice made the dressing that year because Annie was bringing something special.
A big table was set in the living room for adults; the children’s table was in the kitchen. Most of the older kids stood in the yard and put their food on the back porch.
The boys cleaned and dressed three fat hens the day before. They had fried chicken, chicken and dumplings, chicken and dressing, and giblet gravy with chicken. Nothing was wasted. Aunt Eunice and the girls had been cooking for a week. They had all kinds of vegetables, jams, and pickles they had canned in the summer.
When Annie got there, her family brought in a Hickory Nut Cake, stacks of fried pies, and a big oval pot with a lid on it. At their house, company always got the first pick of the food, then adults. Nobody ever left the table hungry, but if the food was gone, the kids ate biscuits with sorghum molasses. They would not have molasses today.
You could have heard a pin drop when the lid was lifted off of that pot. There was a naked, skinned animal. Four legs and a tail were sprawled out in a bed of sweet potatoes. Its head had beady eyes and sharp teeth. An apple was holding the mouth open. It was a possum!!!
Nobody wanted anything to do with a possum. That animal was responsible for most of the chickens they lost. The kids sure did not want to eat it, but they knew better than refusing food. Each child took a sweet potato. They gently moved it from the platter to their plate. Trying not to touch the possum.
As soon as they cleaned their plates, all the kids excused themselves. They said their cousins were walking to the Anna falls, and they did not want to be late. They really just needed to leave, before they were offered seconds.
We had Thanksgiving Dinner at my mother’s table for over sixty years. Rachel and James Welch raised their family of six in a three-bedroom ranch house with one bathroom and a single carport. In the sixties, that was considered pretty good living. Especially if you moved to town from a farm.
They added onto the house, but our family outgrew it. By the time great-grandkids came along our gathering grew to seventy guests. Picnic tables and campfires were outside with people sitting in lawn chairs. If you did not have a seat, you stood and put your food on the car hoods.
On this day, we put up Mom’s Christmas tree. Some of the boys took it from the attic and set it in front of the fireplace. While everyone was getting the decorations out. A bee was buzzing around the light fixture. When they got back from hunting a fly swat, there were four bees. By the time they killed those, a swarm of bees was coming from the Christmas tree box. Two brave souls drug the box outside. Inside was a yellow jacket nest that was the size of a football. Well, that tree was tossed on a campfire. We decorated a spruce in the front yard.
In the 1990’s, Momma’s four children had families of their own. My girls were in high school. Christmas music and hot chocolate really had them excited. With help from the cousins, they got the tree and decorations out of the shed. When the box was opened, a squirrel shot out like a flash of light. It ran around the room, and landed on top of the curtains.
I opened the door for it to go out. Casey got the broom. She was going to swish it toward the door. When the broom reached the squirrel, it ran down the broom, over her shoulder, down her back. That… chainsaw with fur… cleared the room. Everybody went ……totally berserk! !! Casey did some kind of powwow dance. ….GET IT OFF !!!! …… GET IT OFF!!!! ……….We were in the air, on the floor, and out the door.
Large family gatherings are a thing of the past for us. We have so many fond memories of those that sat at our Thanksgiving table. It is also time to make new memories with the ones that are here today. We are so thankful for the love we share. Even these varmints gave us some cherished memories!