Rattlesnake Hollow Thanksgiving

(Rattlesnake Hollow)

You know this year, this damn year, this damn COVID year...

I'm so over this stupid thing.  It is messing with tradition, family, memories.  Plus it's The Hubby's FAVORITE holiday and he is just not understanding canceling family doin's.  I've canceled our huge family thing and will only have the girls at this point and that may only be one girl now because Snicklefritz is to begin in person school next week!!!  Damn Covid!  

Rattlesnake Hollow is located in Jay, Oklahoma.  This house is where my Greatgranny and Great-Granddaddy lived.  It's the house where my most wonderful memories were, especially during Thanksgiving.  Mother would pack up the car with us, Daddy, and so much food.  She would have a gigantic turkey, celery, sage, onion, pie stuff, and when we got there she would begin to help Greatgranny to begin cooking that turkey.  Greatgranny would usually cook hers in one of those roaster ovens.  She would get up in the middle of the night and start the bird, getting back up every hour or so to baste it.  Not only did she get up at daybreak to milk the cow, yes, The Cow, they only had one, Pet, but she was up all night long tending that turkey.  We would get up in the morning and watch the Thanksgiving Day parade on television with Great-Granddaddy while hunters would come in to warm themselves by the fire and talk to Big Dan about the hunt.  They would talk about the big one they shot or bring it to Big Dan to help them butcher it.  I never saw a live deer when I was young, not until we got our cabin and they run around there all the time at dusk or daylight.  Stunning creatures.  I'm rambling I know.  It's just that the memories are flowing right now.  Those Thanksgiving gatherings were not formal by any means.  The food was put on the table and you ate when you ate.  Usually they would leave the food out all day long and cover the food with another tablecloth.  You never knew when Big Dan or Great-Granddaddy would sit down to eat or if there was even a space/chair to sit and eat.  And if you were a woman you stood and watched and made sure the "MEN" were fed first, then the children, and the women were last in line.  It was the times for sure and I knew in my heart, as a young child it was not right, but the MEN ruled that way of life back then.  

Sadly we will create a new kind of Thanksgiving this year but hopefully, next year we will all be vaccinated and this Covid nightmare will be nothing but a horrible memory for the history books.