A COVID Thanksgiving calls for new family traditions — like breakfast for dinner
For as long as I can remember, when anyone asked me about my favorite holiday, I’d say Thanksgiving.
Even as a child, there was no compare — not the buckets of candy at Halloween, the baskets of treats at Easter, the fireworks on the Fourth of July or the piles of presents at Christmas.
The tradition of gathering around a table full of home-cooked food — particularly my dad’s cornbread stuffing and my mother’s sweet potato pie — entranced me from my earliest days.
I’d wake up to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and smell the turkey roasting in the oven. My older brothers and I would stay in our pajamas all morning and play marathon sessions of Monopoly or Boggle. I’d read and relax and watch football and light cinnamon-scented candles.
Around lunchtime, we’d take our seats around the dining room table — extended with extra sections that lived most of the year beneath my parents’ bed — then fill our plates, hold hands and say grace:
“Come Lord Jesus, be our guest. Let this food to us be blessed.”
Our family grew, and so did the Thanksgiving table, as my brothers were joined by wives and children. I moved away, started my own family and established new traditions, but Thanksgiving remained the highlight of my year (followed closely by Christmas Eve candlelight service).
It’s different this year, of course. Everything is. Besides the coronavirus pandemic that’s raging out of control, threatening lives and livelihoods, my own family is navigating life after divorce, learning to adjust and adapt and establish new routines and traditions.
It would be easy to forgo Thanksgiving altogether, to throw in the dishtowel and just forget it: All right, 2020. You win.
But.
It feels as if my favorite holiday is even more significant this year. Not the meal, maybe, or the parade or the football or the board games, but the reason behind it all — the pause amid the worldly chaos to reflect and give thanks.
It’s clear that the best way to protect our loved ones and our communities this holiday season is to avoid large family gatherings. But that doesn’t mean we need to hunker down alone.
I love StoryCorps’ idea of the Great Thanksgiving Listen. The nonprofit group, whose mission is to record and preserve the stories of Americans from various backgrounds, is once again calling on people to interview a grandparent or other elder in an effort to broaden our oral history.
You don’t have to sit side-by-side to participate. Thanks to FaceTime, teleconferencing or just an old-fashioned phone call, you can spend time talking and listening to loved ones and getting to know them better. StoryCorps has even updated its list of potential questions to reflect the COVID-19 pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement.
This year also is a great excuse to start new traditions. My two children and I decided to have the turkey and fixings last weekend, and on Thanksgiving Day we’re having breakfast for dinner — eggs, bacon, pancakes, the works.
We’ll use the laptop to Zoom distant grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, share family stories and see how big the babies are getting.
Things are different, but they can still be delicious.
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This story was originally published November 25, 2020 at 4:07 AM.
