When you think of Thanksgiving what first pops into your mind? The joy of no school and a long weekend. An excuse to stuff yourself silly. The day after filled with bargain hunting at dawn. Or a chance to spend time with grandparents, aunts and uncles, and cousins.
While the days off from school, great food, and shopping are all fun the memories of those events are usually fleeting. After all who really remembers what they bought three years ago at Target at 6:00am. What really sticks with us, when we look back on the holidays of our past, are the people that populate the memories.
Because of this I would like to challenge you to make this an extra special Thanksgiving by taking a step toward adulthood in two ways. First, now that you are older, instead of leaving the work and planning up to the adults, offer to do your share. Sure to some this may look like a right before Christmas ploy for better “I was a good kid” gifts. But you will know that you are doing it for another reason entirely. What reason is that?
Helping out will give you a chance to get to know your family members on a different level. As you spend time with your grandmother setting the table, your uncle unloading the luggage from the car, or your mom whipping up the mashed potatoes, start getting to know them as people not just the roles they play in your life now. Not sure what that means?
Let me give you an example. My father’s mother and I were not close; actually that is a huge understatement. She did not like me much and I returned the favor. But now I realize that if you threw away the titles of grandmother and granddaughter, we would have had a lot in common. So what if she was not the loving grandmother I wanted and I was not the obedient grandchild she had hoped for. If we had just looked beyond who we thought the other person was supposed to be we would have realized that we shared a love of antique shopping and bargain hunting and could have had a lot of fun together.
But I threw that chance away because I was unwilling to get to know her as a person. Luckily I learned. Because of that I got to ride along with my grandfather’s memories as he described traveling in a covered wagon to Oklahoma twice as a kid. I got to imagine the sting of the ball hitting my glove as my dad relived the thrill of pitching for the New York Yankees farm team. And I saw my mother’s father through the eyes of love as my grandmother recalled what a snappy dresser he was as a young man. Yep that’s right- the very same grandfather that I never saw in anything but overalls.
So this Thanksgiving, as you look around the table, take the time to really get to know the people sitting there. Forget roles and titles, past hurts or expectations, and be thankful for this chance to hear their stories and become friends as well as relatives.
“I wish my mother had left me something about how she felt growing up. I wish my grandmother had done the same. I wanted my girls to know me.” Carol Burnett
“I am convinced that material things can contribute a lot to making one’s life pleasant, but, basically, if you do not have very good friends and relatives who matter to you, life will be really empty and sad and material things cease to be important. “ David Rockefeller
