Chapter 54
We went turkey hunting the other day. Instead of a gun, we took a checkbook. And when we finally found just the right bird for our family, we toted him home in a brown paper grocery sack. We’ve come a long way from the days of our pilgrim ancestors!!
A couple of days before Thanksgiving they went out in their black britches, white collars, and big buckled hats with a blunderbuss under their arm to SHOOT a turkey for the celebration.
’Course they couldn’t very well look at the old boy and decide whether he was big enough or not.
It was just Ka-plooey and hope for the best.
Then a few decades later our forefathers of that day started raising tame turkeys for Thanksgiving. I expect there was one wise old bird who kinda knew what was going on each year and made up HIS mind he would NOT be the sacrifice so a bunch of humans could be thankful.
Can’t you just see this old feller! About two or three weeks before guillotine day extra corn would begin arriving at the turkey lot!
That would be his cue to STOP eating, drop one wing like maybe it was et up with some dread disease, start dragging one foot, and yanking out a few feathers now and then.
By the time Thanksgiving morning arrived he’d have everyone in the turkey lot convinced he most certainly needed to talk to the black rooster who was the barn yard witch doctor and psychiatrist. And everyone in the house would have decided they surely did NOT want such a poor specimen as that ugly, bedraggled bird adorning their Thanksgiving table.
So, he watched quietly as his younger friend was chosen, led out to the oak stump and lost his head for the sake of Thanksgiving.
Amazing enough, the old boy’s feathers grew back in a few weeks, his wing healed itself immediately, his foot was instantly cured, and the black rooster declared him fit as a newly strung fiddle.
He did think of his young friend often though and never did forget his ailments when the extra corn began to be rationed out.
Things are sure different now! We BUY a bird suited in pounds to our family needs.
There’s no personal attachment, so the kids don’t refuse to eat “ole Henry” at the dinner table while tears stream down their cheeks.
The old boy has already been unclothed so we don’t have to smell wet feathers when they’re doused with boiling water to make the picking faster.
We call this semi-sterile world we live in a progressive world. And let me tell you, I am truly thankful on Thanksgiving Day that the ONLY thing I have to pick off our bird is it’s plastic coat!!
There’s something about all those yukky smelling feathers and KNOWING I was eating that poor little turkey who followed me all around the yard that took away some of the joy of Thanksgiving.
So, bring on the grocery store turkey, the pumpkin pies, candied yams, baked beans, hot rolls…
what? Calories? You betcha!! Bring on the calories!
One MUST gain weight between now and New Year’s so one can have something to make a resolution about!
! Bring on the turkey and dressing, mashed potatoes, giblet gravy, pecan pies, ambrosia…