Thanksgivings Past

As I prepared for Thanksgiving I was remembering some from my past.  The second year of our marriage and when Johnny was about three months old we had Thanksgiving in our little apartment in Pacific Beach.  We had card tables in our living room and besides my sister Carole and her friend Jean, we had several others friends.  The tables really looked nice and as I remember our first big dinner entertainment was very successful.  Sounds like so much work with a new baby, I must have had lots of help.

The Thanksgiving dinners in our big home on the hill in Glendive were always memorable but mostly I remember when I was in high school.  Mom was such a great cook.  My brother Dick and his wife and baby Rod lived next door and of course, the missionaries were always in attendance.  The house had been remodeled and so there was a huge dining room with beautiful curtains on a huge sunny window.  Another favorite Thanksgiving in Glendive was in my junior year at BYU.  Marilyn had been dating an oilman from Arkansas in the summer and then she went to Idaho  to work in Ferrell's.  Arky called and proposed and we all gathered in our home on the 23rd of Nov 1954.  The Thayne's and I had come from Orem and Provo and I drove the plymouth back to use at BYU.   That was when I had my special Tender Mercy on a slippery hill in Wyoming.   It was a really lovely wedding with my Dad doing the nuptials and we all had long dresses.  Marilyn looked beautiful and Arky was so very handsome.

One memorable Thanksgiving with our children was at Knott's Berry Farm.  At that time they were serving family style and it was a huge room filled with lots of strangers and delicious food being passed around long tables.  I am sure they don't do that anymore.

Another favorite Thanksgiving destination when the children were little was Big Bear.  We rented cabins and went with the Martin Hardy family and visited Santa's Village on the weekend.

Another outstanding Thanksgiving in my mind is 2003 in Maryland.  I was working for the New York SBA and they had borrowed a Marriott kitchen in a motel and served a really delicious dinner.  The butternut squash was especially outstanding.  One of the guys and I had to drive from across the Chesapeake Bay to attend and only had to bring some bottles of wine and cider.  It was well worth the drive.

A couple of times I was in Fort Worth, Texas SBA for Thanksgiving and they would have huge potlucks and did the deep fried turkey out in the parking lot of the big SBA buildings.  Those Texans are marvelous cooks, it was so good, not only the turkey was outstanding, but the wonderful cakes and pies!!

The year of Katrina and Rita I was stationed in Galveston, Texas and we ate at a wonderful buffet.  Thank heaven things were up and running by Thanksgiving even though I had lost 20 lbs in Sept and Oct from scanty eating.

Unfortunately Thanksgiving will always be associated with Richard's death and my own brother Dick as well.  For my brother Dick's funeral I believe I flew to Glendive without Richard or the children.  It was the first time I had been in the new chapel built in Glendive and as I remember a very nice service.

Then my Richard died on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving after we had flown to Reno and Maria had picked us up.  He had heart attack at 2:20 am.  We had a sad Thanksgiving dinner and then Maria flew back to San Diego with me and Richard's body, not sure which day we did what, it is all rather foggy in my mind.  However, this time of year is always a little bit hard for me as it is a very sad remembrance.