Holidays are a time of the year when families come together to celebrate the importance of being surrounded by loved ones.
Thanksgiving starts off the holiday season with the act of giving thanks to one another. Thanksgiving is also a time to remember loved ones who have passed away, family members who are serving in our armed forces and welcoming new faces into the family.
My Thanksgiving Day normally consists of going to watch my former high school Ss. John Neumann and Maria Goretti play our local public high school, South Philadelphia High, in the annual Thanksgiving Day Catholic vs. public league football game.
After long conversations and a victorious win, I head home just in time for the turkey.
These past three years, my Thanksgiving holiday has changed drastically. My dinner table has gone from a five-place dinner setting to four and back to five. In September 2004, I lost my dad to a massive heart attack. In July 2005, my boyfriend, Dave, came into not only mine but my family’s lives. The passing away of my father and the gaining of my boyfriend has given me a different outlook on holidays and life.
The holidays are an important time to be spent with your loved ones such as your family and friends.
This Thanksgiving was the first holiday that I have had to share with my boyfriend, who lives far away from me.
Dealing with the traffic, dinner times and different traditions was all new to me. We did have some similarities such as going to cheer on his high school, St. Augustine Prep play his local public high school in their private vs. public Thanksgiving football game the night before Thanksgiving Day.
When dinner rolled around, the room was filled with conversations, laughter and cheer from many of his mother’s 10 brothers and sisters and their children. Once dinner was over, Dave and I hit the road back to my house for Thanksgiving dinner number two.
Thanksgiving dinner at my house consists of just my immediate family. This holiday is what we call the calm before the storm.
My entire family, my dad’s 6 brothers and sisters and children and many friends come to my house for Christmas Eve, Christmas, New Years Eve and New Years, so Thanksgiving is a time for us to just relax and prepare for the upcoming holidays.
After dinner, we have a tradition where we all go to the movies. This year we saw,”Flushed Away,” an adorable animated movie about a house mouse who lives in luxurious Kensington, England who is flushed down the toilet.
He quickly learns that there is a whole world waiting to be explored when he falls in love with a girl mouse that shows him how to have courage and the importance of family and friends.
The Thanksgiving holiday is now over but the meaning of Thanksgiving can be carried with us throughout the year.
With Christmas approaching, keep the spirit of giving thanks to those who are less fortunate in your heart.
