Seasons of Blessings

As Thanksgiving draws to a close, memories fall gently through my mind floating as stray leaves in the air until landing without sound. Random thoughts scattered in the breezes of past holidays give pause to the darkening sky on the eve of a new day. In the still, I remember loved ones and past holidays filled with friends and family beckoning to my heart with soft voices.

The venue changes each year, as do the people gathered around the table, and thankfulness the only constant. Thankfulness for the basics of food, clothing and shelter; for people who are loved and love us back; for those who have crossed our paths and enriched our lives; for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; for health; for every small thing and every large thing, we are thankful.

We take time to dream about the future and lift prayers for those who are fighting so we might continue to be blessed. We plan for the next holiday and ponder different menus and soon will go back to a routine normalcy. It is in the span of these days that we may need to see the leaves swirl together and fall as a rainstorm gusting into our faces and slapping our sleeping senses. How easy it could be to forget all for whom and all of which we are thankful. As we trudge through barren trees and walk amidst land edged in crimson and gold, we might forget the same landscape dotted with bluebells or laboring under the noise of cicadas or frozen under white icing. We might forget that Thanksgiving is not simply a day but the culmination of seasons and the people who have walked the earth before and with us.

Time moves forward and backward fluidly and we along with it as long as we don’t sit at the table too long.