Gravy is a Beverage

The lovely Madelyn Simone and I had a conversation this week that proves she is directly descended from my gene pool. “What should we have to eat on Thanksgiving, Madelyn?” “We need turkey, and mashed potatoes, and noodles – and gravy – lots of gravy.” Yep, that’s my girl. We love our carbs. I’m guessing we’re related to Erma Bombeck, who said, “I come from a family where gravy was a beverage.”

The Thanksgiving table is a blessed place, and not just for the gravy and mashed potatoes. There’s the rolls, the sweet potato casserole, the green bean casserole with crunchy onions on top, even the sweet pickle mix. Top it all off with pie, accompanied by whipped cream or ice cream, or both, and I’m a happy camper.

Getting beyond the groans of a heavily-laden table, I’m grateful as well for the welcome found at that same table of thanks. To quote Shakespeare, “small cheer and great welcome makes a merry feast.” Our thanksgiving tables will host the in-laws, the out-laws, the grandbabies, the neighbors, and perhaps even the stranger in our midst, drawn together in our desire to make that merry feast. There may also be an empty chair, kept in place for the one who serves our country thousands of miles from home, the one fighting the demons of addiction or being kept behind bars, or the one whose death has left our heart bereft. Like life itself, Thanksgiving holds both the bitter and the sweet.

While we may not count calories on Thursday, Thanksgiving does lend itself to the practice of counting our blessings. We do this with the little ones, reminding them of the houses we live in, the clothes we wear, the food we eat, and the people we love – and who love us in return.

As we count those blessings, we also pause to remember those who are struggling. Like the image of the children in Africa from our childhood, threatened with starvation if we didn’t eat our peas, it’s difficult for children to grasp what that means, what it might look like – and we as adults can struggle with that as well if we’ve never had to worry about where our next meal is coming from.

While I’m not suggesting we do this as a table game between the turkey and the pumpkin pie, an exercise from a staff training many years ago brought this lesson home to me. We were asked to fill in a grid with eight supports that help us be successful in our lives. Examples might be a car that runs, a praying grandmother, a Section VIII voucher (so we don’t pay more than 30% of our income in rent), a college degree, good eyesight, etc. We were instructed to cross two of those supports off our own list. Next, we handed our paper to the person next to us, who was to eliminate a third item, and then the facilitator walked from table to table, drawing a heavy line through a fourth. “Now what?” was the question.

Indeed, now what? When we – our brothers and sisters and ourselves – are faced with poverty or tragedy, now what? When we’re afraid, now what? When we feel unwelcome, now what? In these post-election days, the same question resonates in our homes, in our community, and in our nation. Last week, I shared the image of the delightful Elizabeth Holiday, repeatedly getting stuck and hollering for rescue, unable to stop hollering long enough to recognize her ability to escape. Like my granddaughter, when we quiet our own hollering, we can stand and turn our bodies toward each other. On the Ashland University quad on Monday, November 18^th, 8 p.m., the Ashland Center for Nonviolence is creating a space for us to stand and do just that. In the glow of candlelight, our bodies next to other bodies in our community, we can stand to say, “You’re here and I’m here too. I welcome you. I value you.” We can start—or maybe start over—with that. Perhaps we’ll hear an echo of Wilbur Nesbit’s words as well: “Forever on Thanksgiving Day the heart will find the pathway home.” A blessed Thanksgiving to you.