Maybe some parts of Thanksgiving 2020 should become traditions

This year, Thanksgiving is going to be different.

Some customs will be the same. Mom Smith will host us at her home and she will make all of the Thanksgiving foods we love to eat.

But “customary” stops there.

We won’t see my sister-in-law and her family. They are wisely staying home in western New York.

Those of us who do gather at Mom Smith’s will do so in the back yard or on the front porch. I’m hauling our portable fire pit up there so we can have some warmth while we visit outside. Rather than ooh and ahh as we crowd over the feast at the table, Mom Smith will plate individual portions and bring them to us from inside. We will limit our stay to less than two hours.

It’s what we need to do for the health and safety of our own family.

It’s what we need to do for the health and safety of the people each of us may meet in the next couple of weeks.

It’s what we need to do for the health and safety of the people those people meet in the next couple of weeks.

It’s what we need to do for the health and safety of the medical professionals on the front lines of this pandemic.

In the last 24 hours, I found out that a family of close friends lost their patriarch to COVID over the weekend. This Thanksgiving, they will give thanks for a man who meant the world to them, but is no longer in the world with them.

Our family will give thanks that, so far, all of us are making it through the pandemic without getting sick or worse. Many members of both the Irwin and Smith families are vulnerable to COVID. But, so far, we are making it through with our health and lives intact. Some may not be at Thanksgiving this year, but at least they may still be able to come to the next one. That is a big reason for thanks!

We are keeping our bodies far apart this Thanksgiving. But if we choose, this Thanksgiving can get our hearts and minds closer to the real meaning of the holiday. It is often easier to be thankful for something when it is absent and missed than when it is present and taken for granted.

Could this Thanksgiving start a lot of new family traditions?

Not traditions like eating outside in Michigan in late November!

But could new family traditions of giving thanks start this year?

I can imagine that, each Thanksgiving from now on, our family might go outside before we sit down to Thanksgiving dinner. We might stand six feet apart in the cold and say a prayer of thanks for how we made it through hard times that kept us apart.

Then we’ll go back inside and sit elbow-to-elbow as we share our family-style feast at one table. We’ll cry and laugh at stories about 2020 (and other hard years we endured together).

If you think about it, aren’t most family traditions born of hardship? Don’t they come about when you do whatever it takes to keep the family together in a tough time?

What turns temporary changes into traditions is love. When you make a change, like moving Thanksgiving dinner to the back yard, you do it for love. What looks like disruption is actually discovery or re-discovery of meaning.

So the temporary change you make for love in 2020 could become the tradition that reminds you of that love for years to come.

This Thursday may not feel the way we wish it would feel.

But if we do whatever we do for love and we let our longing turn to thanks, the memory of this year may feel sacred and special for the rest of our lives.