Thanksgiving is upon us once again. It seems to come quicker and quicker each year.

Thanksgiving is observed on the fourth Thursday of November. In 2024, it will occur on November 28, the latest date possible. That means the span between Thanksgiving and Christmas days will only be twenty-seven days, the shortest span of time possible between those two holidays.

My first happy thoughts of Thanksgiving are of my mother, father and I going to my half-brother Jerry Sampson’s house to eat dinner. I can still taste that delicious dressing and leftover turkey leg that we brought home. We ate Thanksgiving with my brother and his family for many years.

Dad usually went to bed at or shortly after dark, but on one of our Thanksgiving trips to Jerry’s, Dad somehow was “pretty well lit” by the time we got home. He was in a mellow mood, “feeling no pain,” as they say.

He felt so good that he sat up late and even allowed me to watch Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory on our black-and-white television in its entirety. That was the first time I saw that movie—I think I was seven—and Willy Wonka always makes me think of Thanksgiving.

In later years, after Dad passed away, Mother and I usually took the Thanksgiving meal with my sister Anna Mae Kerr. As a matter of fact, we took many meals with Anna Mae and her two youngest kids, as she loved to have us come over for supper at least once a week.

There came a time when Mother and I went our separate ways on Thanksgiving Day. Mother still went to Anna Mae’s, but I started driving to my Aunt Fleetie’s house. Fleetie and I would walk one block up Hoitt Avenue to Aunt Duskie’s house, located on the dead end of Whittle Springs Road. Thanksgiving dinner was the only meal I ever knew my Aunt Duskie to cook. She even had her sister Fleetie bake corn bread for her at Fleetie’s house, as cooking made Duskie’s house too hot in the summer. Strange that it didn’t make Fleetie’s house hot as well, because neither sister had air conditioning.

In a few years Fleetie moved to an apartment a couple of miles away from Duskie in the Northgate Terrace. Now both Fleetie and Duskie lived on Whittle Springs. I was an undergraduate English major at Lincoln Memorial University at that time. I would spend the night before Thanksgiving with Fleetie, then I would drive her to Duskie’s for dinner.

The first year I was in college, the academic year was divided into three quarters. The first quarter ended the day before Thanksgiving, and the second quarter didn’t begin until after New Year’s. I had basically a winter break that included the greater part of the last week of November, the entire month of December, and the first week of January. That gave me an early taste of what retirement must be like. It was so pleasant to be able to anticipate Christmas for the first time since I was five years old with no school worries at all.

Then LMU’s academic calendar changed, and the academic year was now divided into two semesters. The first semester ended between Thanksgiving and Christmas. That meant a long break for Thanksgiving weekend, but there was still some class time and final exams between Thanksgiving and Christmas. During one such break, I had to read Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter.” That book always takes me back to Fleetie’s apartment and reminds me of a happy Thanksgiving weekend.

In later years Fleetie went to the nursing home, and Duskie’s husband, Uncle Roy Jones, died. After that I ate Thanksgiving dinner anywhere I might be invited. Sometimes it was back to Anna Mae’s, but there were exceptions.

I remember once eating at my sister Marie Wilder’s house. The memory from that occasion that I cannot shake is my Aunt Vallie asking one of our family at the table if she and her fiancé were having intimate relations. In some families, that could have proven a disaster, but the question was handled with a tactful reply of, “That’s none of your business.” Discussion ended.

I was in my 30s when I ate my first Thanksgiving meal in a restaurant. The idea had never appealed to me, and this might have been a cool experience, without the warmth of the home fire, so to speak, if not for my very entertaining dining companions. To this day it remains one of my greatest honors and joys that I was privileged to dine that Thanksgiving Day with none other than Ms. Winnie McDonald, longtime legendary English teacher at Horace Maynard High School, and her most colorful daughter, Sharon McDonald.

At the time, Ms. Winnie was living with Sharon in a condo off Haynes-Sterchi Road, close to Cedar Lane and Merchants Road. I picked up the duo in my car. I had recently leased the first and last car I will ever lease. It was a hunter green 1998 Saturn with beige leather interior.

Sharon directed me to her Aunt Mildred’s house so that she could pick up a pumpkin pie that Mildred had baked for her sister Winnie. Sharon described her Aunt Mildred as “exactly like Edith Bunker.”

This part is a little foggy in memory, but somehow Sharon went and got the pie, then must have gone back inside for something. When she came back, Sharon was horrified to see that the runny pie had leaked from its pan onto the leather upholstery.

Any of you who knew Sharon well will remember her familiarity with expletives. In her mortification at the pie’s filling oozing onto the car’s backseat, her epithets flowed colorfully and freely into the blessed holiday air. “I’ll be -------------! That -------- runny --- pie has leaked all over Ronnie’s brand new car! Let me go get a -------- rag to clean that --------- mess up!”

I was in the driver’s seat, and Ms. Winnie was in back, directly behind me. We sat in blissful silence for a minute or so, then Ms. Winnie sheepishly said, “I’m sorry the pie ruined your car.”

I replied something to the effect, “That’s all right, Ms. Winnie, it’s no big deal. It’s leather—it’ll wipe right up. Nobody will even be able to tell it ever happened.”

“In other words, you’re saying s--- happens?” the elderly former English teacher paraphrased.

I laughingly assured Ms. Winnie that was exactly what I meant. She said, “I’ll tell Sharon that when she comes back. It’ll make her feel better.”

No one can buy from a shelf the holiday entertainment that I’ve experienced throughout the years.

May your Thanksgiving be filled with many laughable memories to sustain you through the Christmas season, into the New Year, throughout all the years of your life. To help, I leave you with the next Question of the Week and some corny turkey jokes from emails I’ve received.

Answer to Question of the Week # 37

Normally it would have been a good thing when Fred’s wife told him she missed him. Why was it not a good thing in this case? (Answer: As she said she missed him, she was reloading.)

Question of the Week # 38

How is common sense like deodorant? (See next week’s article in historicunioncounty.com for the answer.)

Turkey Jokes

What did the turkey say to the turkey hunter on Thanksgiving Day? Quack, quack!

What do you call a turkey the day after Thanksgiving? Lucky!

What sound does a turkey's phone make? Wing wing wing!

Can a turkey jump higher than a house? Yes, because houses can't jump!

Why do turkeys love rainy days? They love “fowl” weather.

Why do turkeys gobble? Because they never learned table manners.

What’s a popular Thanksgiving dance? The turkey trot.

When do you serve rubber turkey? Pranksgiving!

Why did the turkey play the drums in his band? Because he already had drumsticks!

Who is not hungry at Thanksgiving? The turkey, because he’s already stuffed!

If you call a large turkey a gobbler, what do you call a small one? A goblet.

Why was the turkey arrested? The police suspected “fowl” play.

Why shouldn't you sit next to a turkey at dinner? Because he will gobble it up!

What type of glass does a turkey drink from? A goblet.

What happened to the turkey that got in a fight? He got the stuffing knocked out of him!