Around the table.....

It's Tuesday and I just remembered that means trash at the curbside tonight. Between the time change and the garbage pick up day change I am confused, often.

We are going to Pescadero for Thanksgiving. The original plan had Jenn, Eric, and Nick going in Harvey the RV. Sue and Alan, our son in law's parents, in their RV, I don't know if it has a name. They were going to stay in the RV camping area. Wanda and I would stay in the lodge. Last night I discovered the lodge rooms do not have televisions. Now I have mixed emotions about going.

I have suffered through years of embarrassing turkey day football games. It's last win in 2003, Detroit Lion teams have been out scored 258-98 over the last seven years. The loses include a 45-24 game against New England, a 47-10 drubbing by Tennessee, and a pathetic 41-9 showing against the Colts.

This year the Detroit Lions have a 7-3 record and will be playing the unbeaten Green Bay Packers. I'm sure all the prognosticators will make the Packers favorites but it should be a good game. I could record it but once a live event is over I don't enjoy watching. I could run out today and buy a device that would enable me to watch the game via computer but don't want one. The lodge has free Wi Fi but no televisions, go figure.

When all is said and done there is no way I would miss the opportunity to spend time with the family for a football game. Or at this point in my life, much else.

Growing up in Detroit the Hudson's Thanksgiving Day Parade and the Lions game were both traditions not to be missed. Many years I stood on Woodward Ave. with a drippy nose and a chilled face watching the floats and moving displays pass. Then it was home to a glass of hot chocolate and the noon thirty ballgame. We always watched on TV as tickets were hard to get.

Those childhood memories all have one thing in common, family. Now that I think about it, I wouldn't trade the day with my family for television. Especially now that these days will hopefully remain in our grandsons memory. Once in a while I need to think about how my actions effect others. The only way I will not be forgotten is to give the kids something to remember. I think I can do better than "he always stayed home."

As a kid we went to Aunt Lee and Uncle Gil's for Thanksgiving. Their warm and comfortable home was always open to us.  To accommodate everyone leaves were put in the already large table. I enjoyed helping by laying out the protective pads, linen, china, glass and silverware. I usually needed help remembering what went where, but I did my best. Once everything was ready the adults were seated around the beautiful table in the formal dining room.

The dining room table was so long that once the kids table was in place we would be sitting in the next room, the den. We had a folding card table or two for all the cousins to squeeze around. I always tried to avoid sitting on the piano bench. I didn't like touching ass cheeks with anyone, especially if I got a left handed person on the wrong side.

My cousins were as different as night and day, the moon and the sun. Especially the girls and the boys. The girls, always soft spoken and polite, refined. Some of the boys, egged on by the "snooty" like girls, could be rather vulgar. The more Eeewww you are disgusting the girls said, the more bodily functions and noises the boys would come up with. By the way, we quickly realized that even though they were in a different room the adults still heard us.

I remember this like it was yesterday, my cousin saying, "Mama Mia, Papa Pee-ya in the soup." He was a couple of years older but obviously, less mature. Now, every Thanksgiving this stupid joke runs around in my brain until mercifully it finds my ear canal, and falls out.

Unlike so many movies where the adults fall asleep after dinner, my family sat around the table and talked. After coffee and dessert everyone would move to the living room and continue conversations. I loved sitting on the floor listening to everyone. I thought them all interesting people and great story tellers.

Now that all is said and done, no television? It's fine with me. Maybe my extended family will start a new tradition, or even better, revive an old one, lots of after dinner talk.