far more than the family dinner

 "Of course, Thanksgiving is far more than the family dinner and the national festival. All people have always had harvest celebrations of one kind or another, so there is nothing distinctive about a feast time after the crops are in. But our Thanksgiving seems very close to our relation with God. It has a deep religious significance not always spoken of, but, I think, felt.

I am thankful for love, and friends, and the family gathering together. For starlight over the old apple orchard. For the chilly sweetness of peepers in April. For my winter birds, so brave, so hungry, and particularly for my little chickadee with the bent wing who bangs away at the suet cake right while I type. He cocks a shining eye at me and seems to say, 'Life is really what you make of it, eh?'

And it is good to take time to be thankful, for it is all too easy to let the world's trouble sweep over one in a dark flood and to fall into despair."

                                                                           -   Gladys Taber