Gobble, Gobble, Gobble

by Angela Sanford

This is one time in the school year when I miss teaching the littles – Thanksgiving. The fun crafts and my favourite Thanksgiving story: “Twas the Night before Thanksgiving” by Dav Pilkey.  As a matter of fact, I watched a reading of this earlier this week, with friends who have their own littles. Of course, it’s a story my own granddaughter will certainly hear a few times before she’s a teen.

     The children in the story are shocked to learn why Farmer Mack Nugget is raising the birds and the hatch a plan to rescue them. This reminds me of the first time Dan and I order some poults to raise. They week old poults arrived at our house before we got home from work, but the boys were eager to take us to view them and announce that they had name each of them. Dan and I caught a glance at each other with the simultaneous thought of “OH NO! How are we going to explain to the boys that these are not pets?”

     The harsh reality of the purchase was soon to be presented, when Devin, our oldest, pointed to one bird and declared, “His name is Easter,” then to another, “His name is Christmas,” and another, “His name is Thanksgiving.” Dan and I were each so relieved to know they understood the destiny of these turkeys that the names of the other gobblers didn’t matter at all. 

     It’s been a few years since we raised our own turkeys for dinner, but we purchase our gobbler from a local farm whose son has the same dry sense of humour that Devin had at that young age.

     For many years, Thanksgiving dinner was celebrated with family and friends at our camp. However, the past few years it has returned to our home, with a slight struggle to coordinate everyone’s schedule for a single gathering. Most years we figure it out and this year, with everyone living in the same province the organization was somewhat simpler and for that I am very grateful.