Please Pass The Cranberries

Here in the wee early a.m. hours of this Thanksgiving Day, I must excitedly tell you that today is my favorite day of the year.

It's impossible to beat the three F's: family, food and football. Even if the Lions look like turkeys, there are still those first two F's to consider...and those are a couple mighty fine F's.

A Thanksgiving memory that has lived on and grown to nearly legendary status in my family is the tale of the cranberries.

Back about a thousand years ago when I was 11, I was moving the dish of cranberry sauce from the kitchen counter to the table...all of about eight feet. Unbeknownst to me, my sister was taking a photo of the general scene: my mom and grandma in the kitchen, the table all set in the dining area...and me.


As I turned to move toward the table, the flash on the camera went off (as evidenced by my closed-eye expression and the lovely shadows outlining me) and in my surprise I accidentally tilted the dish a bit too far (as evidenced by the gelatinous mass caught in mid-flop that is way too far gone to recover).

For years after that, it was my job to ceremoniously transport the cranberries from counter to table in a dramatic reenactment of the 1980 photo. (sans flop, of course.)

(for the record, this is the first...and hopefully only...photo of myself on this blog. flattering, isn't it?)

May you have many things to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.
And may your cranberries be free of floor dust.

"Eternity is two people and a roast turkey."

—James Dent