Bea V. Larsen . . . .Commentaries |
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Bea V. Larsen is a Senior Mediator at the Center for Resolution of Disputes in |
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A Melancholy Day This entry was posted on 11/4/2011 5:20 PM and is filed under Personally Speaking. When my kids were young, Halloween was my favorite holiday. With little spent in time or money, the night ended with costumes askew and each child's candy hoard spread out on the living room floor. Apples disdained, chocolate eaten with abandon.
It seems right that Thanksgiving should be next in line for favored holiday status, a time to remember all that is most treasured, friendships and family, and savor favorite recipes. Seems right but is not quite true. Last year, with two children living far away, I joined my nearby son's family and friends. We were all smiling as the sumptuous meal was presented, but I had to purposefully pull myself back from a focus on who was no longer at the table. Then I talked about him, casually, even telling funny stories about his carving exploits, and I could breathe again. But what I wanted was to go home, be alone with my thoughts, and allow my practiced smile to dim. My older son phoned and sensed my mood, which he said he shared. We reminisced about years long past, the annual early Thanksgiving morning drive to the Chicago suburbs, the kids snug under blankets dozing in the back seat, then waking as dawn lightened the sky. On reaching the halfway mark, we pulled into a familiar roadside restaurant for pancakes and hot coffee. The aroma of the feast filled the air when we reached our destination. Cousins fairly tumbled over each other in joyful reunion, as the Larsen clan gathered in the small prairie town where some still live. Too many of us to sit all together, except around the ping-pong table in Aunt Joan's basement, hot dishes carefully carried down a dimly lit steep cellar stairway. Babies passed from arms to arms, giving new parents respite. How many times did the scene replay? Until one day our children returned to their childhood home with their own small people carried aloft on shoulders grown broad and strong. The familiar aromas are then in my kitchen, which is soon crowded with helping hands. As the day waned, Len and I would leave for an evening walk, hand in hand in the dark cold winter air. Soon another Thanksgiving Day will have passed. Everywhere I'll hear: How was your Thanksgiving? The response: Great! My response: Fine. In this answer there is both truth and undisclosed sadness, and I know not just my own. For every family there is a story to be told that the holiday evokes, remembered joys and pleasures, some sorrow, some regret. Oddly I almost savor my melancholy mood, for it intensifies the moments remembered. Would the losses be so mourned if less precious? But, if I were king of the world, once the expressions of gratitude Thanksgiving brings to our thoughts and our words are again a memory, we would now fast forward to the first of next year, and bypass all the holiday merriment of December. How humbug is that? CommentsDisplay comments as (Linear | Threaded)
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