Beyond the free-for-all approach to large family get-togethers for in-laws and outlaws, her family no longer has any manners at table. There is no formal prescription or proscription of actions surrounding holiday get-togethers, except for the one great shared meal each Thanksgiving. Rules apply then. Animosities must be held in abeyance. A hierarchy of age is instituted for serving and seating. The smallest children are banished to another room, at least to another table, usually a card table, or TV trays. Adults are left to their strained relationships, but everyone is expected to be on their best behavior: no discussion of politics, religion or sex, by tacit, mutual agreement. All three subjects, therefore, become focal points of riotous disagreement within the first few minutes. It had been her deepest hope that it would work this year, but she knew it might be doomed and had planned for it.
She realizes one result of not allowing the youngest children at the main table will be their postponed acquisition of profanity until preschool. But the best result is that the children are not served from the turkey she prepared especially for the feuding adults from her own very special recipe.
Rick Hartwell believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like William Blake, that the instant contains eternity.
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