Thanksgiving 2020

On the Porch

Onisha Ellis

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving, I hope you enjoyed yours as well. Since my mom’s passing in 2001 Thanksgiving has been bittersweet often accompanied by outbursts of tears as I worked in the kitchen. This year there were no tears.

Our daughter flew up from Florida Thanksgiving morning to be with us for the weekend. After picking her up at the airport, we drove for an hour and a half to a friend’s home to enjoy Thanksgiving together. Bringing in the side dishes I had spent two days preparing, reminded me of Thanksgivings past when my siblings and their families arrived laden with food.

The men were in charge of frying the turkey while the women enjoyed the comfortable conversation of old friends and shared memories. Quite a switch from the past where the men watched television and the women labored in the kitchen!

We spent the night with our friends as our home is a two hour drive away. Our husbands retired to the “man cave” while the ladies talked and shared laughter.

Monday arrived and our daughter’s short visit was over. She was booked on a 10 pm flight and the weather forecast was predicting snow so we decided to secure a room at a hotel near the airport. We are Florda drivers and not at all competent to drive over snowy mountains late at night. Plus canceling a late night flight was not unheard of from the small airport. Our daughter packed overnight clothes and her special memory foam gel pillow should the flight be cancelled.

Her flight was delayed by an hour but at least it did depart. She had left her pillow in the trunk of our car rather than have us haul it into the hotel unnecessarily. The following morning was very cold…18 F degrees when we went out to put our luggage in the car trunk. I reached in to move the pillow and my fingers couldn’t grasp it. The pillow was frozen!

We did a little bit of shopping before heading home. There were only patches of melting snow in the city so we decided to pick up some fried chicken and picnic on the Blue Ridge Parkway on our way home. We were a bit anxious about the parkway being open but were pleased to see the entrance to the parkway was open….except that less than half a mile away the barricades were up.

We didn’t see any snow but someone took this picture near Maggie Valley.

We arrived home with sweet memories tucked in our minds and hearts. Tucked along side these memories is also sorrow for family and friends who have experienced the death of loved ones this year.

After my retirement, I decided to re-learn the canning and preserving skills I learned from my mother but hadn’t practiced for twenty years. I titled the blog Old Things R New to chronicle my experience.  Since then I have been blessed to have six other bloggers join me, DiVoran Lites, Bill Lites,  Judy Wills, Louise Gibson, Janet Perez Eckles and Melody Hendrix

In addition to blogging, I work as the publicist/marketer/ amateur editor and general  “mom Friday” for my author daughter, Rebekah Lyn. I also manage her website, Rebekah Lyn Books  where we frequently host the best in up and coming authors.

My 2020 goal is to use my love of photographs and words to be an encourager on social media. You can visit Real Life Books and Media You Tube Channel if you would like to view some of the mini-videos I have created for our church, Gateway Community in Titusville, Fl.

Tags: Friends and Thanksgiving\, Thanksgiving