The Incredible Shrinking Family

Return with us now to Thanksgiving, 1970. Gathered around the table here at the homestead would be my stepmother, Ruby, my father, my brother, my sister and probably whatever boyfriend she had then, my grandparents, my Great Uncle Devoe and my Great Aunt Helen.

Or how about Thanksgiving, 1985. My stepmother Ruby was deceased, as were my grandparents and great uncle and aunt. My brother was off with his wife's family, but my sister and her husband were there. My father had remarried, and my second stepmother's daughter and her children and their friends were there. The spread was amazing. Turkey, stuffing, sweet corn, sweet potatoes, creamed spinach, cranberry sauce were the standard fare.

And here we are now. Thanksgiving, 2003. Just my father and I. We went to spend the day with my brother's wife's family, consisting of her brothers and sisters and their progeny.

It was a wee bit taxing. I had to remember all of those people's names. The food was wrong, save for the turkey and stuffing. At one point, I greeted someone by the name of his deceased brother. (Oops.) They're all decent enough. There was a 'kid's table' for the progeny, and I was glad of that, as adolescents just suck the energy out of the room.

After dinner, my father decided that it was Time To Go, and I was interrupted from playing a game of billiards in the den over the barn with the word that he was sitting in the car, waiting for me.

My father couldn't remember the last time that he left the homestead on Thanksgiving. Probably the first time in his adult life.

Death is such a sundering. There's not just the loss of the person who dies, but also all of the connections that we have to others through that person. "Time is a careless theif," sings Emmylou Harris, "Taking those we love, and leaving us our grief."

We're invited back for Christmas Day. I'd rather eat glass and wash it down with brake fluid. But in all likelihood, that's where my father and I will be heading in about a month. To celebrate the day with these nice, simple people. Whose only fault in my eyes is that they're the wrong people.

Huh. And next year? When my brother and his wife are in Florida? Will it just be me and my Dad? Hard to say.

Here's another thought. I'll probably outlive my father and my brother. What then?

Well, actually, that will be good as far as the holidays will be concerned. I'll have the leeway to gather around me people I love. Replacing this faux family that's replaced my real family with a chosen family.

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