Red's Wrap
Happiness. It's relative.
Five Thoughts on Thanksgiving 2017
Bless teenagers who walk in the door mad and morose but let themselves be brightened by the day and the food and the people who ask what they’re thankful for and then listen to the entire, very long, list. If we give up too quick and get mad back, we never see the brightening which is lovely and not to be missed.
The Thanksgiving imperfection of the year rotates so that the stuffing that was perfect last year is dry bread the next. This year’s imperfection was my gravy. Incredible flavor from hours’ long simmering of turkey neck bones and gizzards, carefully crafted for just the right consistency, and then finished off with pan drippings from a beautifully roasted turkey. A lot of pan drippings. A lot. The path from gravy to au jus is paved with the inability to quit while ahead.
Close calls seem undeserved. There have been harrowing health times with a couple of our adult children this past year. Scary phone calls followed by long conversations in hospital corridors and thick, bottom of the pot, coffee from the nurses’ station. They survived. Today I messaged back and forth with a childhood friend who lost her daughter last spring. Neither of us deserved what we got. It’s all random and unfair, really.
I’m trying to write a poem about rust for submission to an anthology about what kind of community we want. In it, I will be the rusted one.
“Don’t go lookin’ for trouble, trouble will find you” could be a fine tattoo if I was a tattooing person. Steve Goodman’s song from the 70’s has been in my head all day. Back then, I looked and found trouble, attracted it like a magnet in a box of metal shavings. No more. I just sit back now and wait for trouble to come find me. Which it will.
“Lookin’ for Trouble” by Steve Goodman
The first time you take a drink
It makes you spit & sputter
Shiver and shudder
Mumble and mutter
But the next one tastes so sweet
It makes you want another
And now you’re drinkin’ all the time
If you’re lookin’ for trouble
Trouble will find you
Trouble will find you
Trouble will find you
Don’t go lookin’ for trouble
Trouble will find you
And you sure don’t have to look too hard
The first time you shade the truth
You want to run and hide
Your tongue gets tied
Your throat gets dry
And you start thinkin’ that maybe no one knows you lied
And now you’re shady all the time
Don’t go lookin’ for trouble
Trouble will find you
Trouble will find you
Trouble will find you
Don’t go lookin’ for trouble
Trouble will find you
And you sure don’t have to look too hard
Trouble will pin a tail on you
And follow you around
And catch you when your number’s up
And when your guard is down
The first time you fall in love
The skies are sunny
She calls you honey
Your jokes are funny
Then she reminds you she was only in it for the money
And now you’re drinkin’ all the time
Don’t go lookin’ for trouble
Trouble will find you
Trouble will find you
Deaf, dumb, & blind you
Don’t go lookin’ for trouble
Let me remind you
You sure don’t have to look too hard
Trouble in your own backyard
Here is Steve Goodman singing this song 41 years ago. I was 28. It was sort of the story of my life at the time.
______________
Photo by Ryan Johns on Unsplash
4 Comments on “Five Thoughts on Thanksgiving 2017”
Leave a Reply
Recent Comments
 | joviald3f8e0e214 on Where’s the Money When y… |
 | Reflections of an Un… on Where’s the Money When y… |
 | ellice on Two Vignettes for Your Reading… |
 | Nguyễn Thị Phương Tr… on People You Can’t Forget:… |
 | Nancy Bauer-King on People You Can’t Forget:… |
Snow Door | wisconsinacademy.org
Listen to Jan read her essay “Billy” presented on WUWM’s Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “At the Breakfast Bar” on WUWM Lake Effect
Jan’s essay “The Parish Hall,” on WUWM Lake Effect
“Fury Cannot Touch Me,” Modern Love, NYT, 9/29/11
Our 15 year old grandson son came in like a lion and left like a lamb this Thanksgiving. Some things are universal.
Jan’s advice on blessing the teenagers is so great, why only do it one day a year? We should extend this to all 365. Being at least sometimes mad and morose is part of being a teenager. Part of the fun of being one of their elders is we know that, and by now we know them, and so we can quickly get beyond that and welcome them and make a joke or two and make them feel great, even though they may not be willing to reveal how we’ve made them feel.
Hi Jan. Oscar Wilde would be proud of your gravy-based epigram. I think it may well turn out to be one of the maxims which should guide my life. Like the North star but, and I have to use the expression again, gravy-based.
Yes. Gravy-based. It’s a thing. A new thing. 🙂