To be alive, to know love, to have food and shelter. Warm in winter, cool in summer. It's so weird that luck determines much of your fortune. You can manipulate outcomes, of course. But fighting illness, losing or gaining a soulmate or two or three, living in peace or a war torn region -- that's rarely your doing. Good fortune is little more than a favorable hand of cards. My father, who liked to reflect on just about anything in his older years, died very much alone (girlfriend notwithstanding), chained to alcohol. And yet, he looked back on decades of his life and said -- I was just so lucky.
I woke up this morning from a dream where I was explaining to my teacher why I failed to prepare for her exam (and therefore got a failing grade). In the dream, I reviewed my life of strange choices, made impulsively, and I noted that most of the time, it all worked out just fine. Luck was with me. Dreams are often twisted fragments of reality. This one wasn't so twisted (though I never quite got a failing grade, lucky devil that I was!).
I'm thankful for having had a good enough set of cards so that, despite stumbles and messes here and there, I could work out grand outcomes at every turn.
Reeling back to something more prosaic, I'm grateful for all the things I describe here on Ocean. Henry's sweet morning greeting, the frost on the ground, his warm sweater which makes him look like a pooch setting out for the ski hills, breakfast, family, Ed... you know the details -- they're here in some configuration. Every day.
(a bitter cold Thanksgiving)
("I'm ready to go in")
Henry and I go to my daughter's home. For the morning, and then again in the afternoon and evening.
The two dogs, of course, are delighted with this arrangement. They have their moments of active crazies, but not nearly as much as in our first visits.
The Thanksgiving Day parade is on -- a tradition that no one wants to break, even if most of it is only mildly entertaining.
(getting ready)
Eventually, Snowdrop and I take the dogs out. I don't know about Goose, but for Henry this is a time to abandon all learning and good manners.
It's like putting a boisterous child on a bus with another boisterous child. You'll find yourself with a big multiplier of boisterousness.
Kids eat lunch, dogs occupy themselves in ways I'd rather not know about. Though I'd guess anything that Henry is at the table waiting for a handout.
We take the two guys out to the Penni Klein dog park.
(three kids, two big dogs)
We knew it would be cold of course. Below freezing for sure. But the wind! Biting force, right in your face. Well, the pooches got their romp.
I go back to the Edge to do a little prep cooking and baking. I'd made the cranberry sauce this morning. Time to bake corn muffins and prepare the beans, the mushrooms, the corn, the herbs and yes, the dreadfully potatoes that require a mandoline slicer -- the one for which I lost the safety holder. I try to keep slices of fingers out of the potato mix.
And now I am back at the big house with the five of them, the two pooches and Ed.
(most likely, she's mixing things up for him)
The turkey is in the oven, as are the potatoes. The corn and, separately, the green beans and mushrooms are on the stove top.
And the Thanksgiving meal is ready.
(gossiping about their humans)
(Henry is eyeing the turkey)
It's not my 73rd Thanksgiving with family at a large table staring at a giant roast turkey. I skipped a whole stack of them when I lived in Poland. And of course, there were the years when it was just Ed and me and the kids were visiting other sets of parents. I never roasted a bird for just the two of us. We went for Chinese food once, Japanese another time, Indian yet another, and finally a traditional restaurant Thanksgiving meal which was probably the least interesting of them all. But here we are, at the table with the older of the younger families and it is lively and delicious and contentment flows from one side of the table to the other and yes, I am extremely thankful. For the luck, for the love. For Thanksgiving.
One dog is happy to rest and wait for the meal to be done. The other is at each person's side, waiting to see if anyone will cave and give him a piece of turkey. (I have never caved. I cannot be so confident with the kids.) Two rescue dogs, from the same state, with such different personalities. And anxieties, born, I'm sure of their rough beginnings. Goose is scared of big men. If Ed stand us, he barks at him. Sitting down, he comes to him for rubs and comfort. But once he moves around again, Goose let's out his woofs.
For Henry, on the other hand, it's all about familiarity. Ed is old stuff for him. He loves to come over for scratches and pats. But, meet a stranger waiting for the elevator at the Edge and my pooch lets loose with his own set of barks.
(to get three kids and two dogs to be still for a photos was... challenging! Ed did his best..)
(the young family did better with just one dog -- their own.)
Thanksgiving, 2025. A superbly warm and loving day for all of us. Beautiful here, and in Chicago, and in your home too, I hope.
With so much love!!
