Thanksgiving 2020

Thanksgiving is a great reminder to stop and give thanks for the abundance of God's blessings. However, it is also becoming a time to realize how quickly those blessings can be taken away.

Last year, the holiday was kind of blur of activity. My paternal grandfather had been in an accident and passed away just a few days before Thanksgiving. I had an abbreviated lunch with mom's family before my parents and I joined dad's family at the funeral home. The next two days were taken by the visitation, funeral, and being around family. It made us remember to be thankful for those around us as they can quickly be gone.

With all the restrictions and quarantine this year, I didn't expect we would have much of a get-together this year. We had hoped to have mom's mother join us for lunch, but her retirement home discouraged it and she couldn't come. As has become usual, my parents joined me around the computer in my bedroom to watch the morning church service. I did actually get in my chair for our turkey lunch that mom made for the three of us. After we were full, we went out to the cemetery to put a wreath on grandpa's head stone.

I miss my grandfathers, but I am thankful that everything happened when it did. At his funeral last year, none of us could have guessed what would change in a few months. A number of elderly members from my church, some who I knew well, passed away this year. For the most part, they hardly had any visitation, funeral, or recognition of the life they lived. Small graveside services for family and online obituaries are about all we see. Many Thanksgiving tables were missing most of their extended relatives, and ones that will never return.

No matter what, I am thankful for all those God has put around me. Living the quad life, I have had opportunity to get to know more people than I likely would otherwise. However, it gets hard when some of them are gone and you don't get opportunity to say good-bye. It has been well said that we are living a new normal. I fear more the old normal will not return and lonely holidays with not being surrounded by family will be a distant memory. Any chance you get, be thankful for who, and what, we have been given, before they are gone as well.