The truth is, I really love Thanksgiving. I always have, I love the noise of it all. You know all of your family getting together in one house and making a bunch of food and arguing with each other, and watching football, playing spades, more arguing, kidding playing video games and running around, the grown up table, the kids table. There is just something magical about being with family, even if you really don't like all of your family, you get together on Thanksgiving and it really just doesn't matter. Oh and then you get to eat and eat and eat. I mean seriously, best holiday ever.
The thing is though, as you get older and your life changes and your idea of home and family changes and you realize that the ideas of all of these things that you have in your head from when you were a child never really are quite the same anymore, you realize that maybe it's okay to start new traditions. Traditions that maybe 10 years from now you'll feel the same about as the traditions of the past that you've stored up that get you all teary eyed whenever you think about them.
And thus GUTSGIVING was born. And to be honest who knows if and when we will ever do this again, but I'm glad we got the chance to do it this year. Because with all the hustle and bustle of knocking out a full Thanksgiving meal and all the drinking we were doing. There wasn't much time to feel bad about missing being home. There was only the joy of being in the kitchen and the anticipation of the meal that we were going to eat.
For those of you that were following GUTSGIVING yesterday and saw the pictures, let me just say that they really don't even do it all justice. It was such a great day, that I wish everyone once in their lives could be a part of. I have a new found respect for my Mother and all my Aunts that were always and are always in the kitchen slaving away to make a Thanksgiving dinner happen and to make it happen on time.
We said we were going to try and have everything ready by 3pm, but we didn't get it all together until 530pm. Because of course we completely underestimated the amount of food that we were making. And the amount was a GUT load. I can promise you that seeing us in the kitchen and out in the living room prepping the food and drinking, and getting the food ready and drinking was a funny sight to see.
And the truth is it all became about more than the food and the drinking and the movies and the football. It felt like the start of a tradition that will live on for the rest of my life. And the thing about it is, that there may never be another GUTSGIVING in the form of what it was this year. It may never be two guys held up in an apartment making and eating a whole Thanksgiving dinner. But I feel like in my heart of hearts it will always be there.
I feel like this year I regained my love for Thanksgiving, and I have GUTSGIVING to thank for all of that. God I have no idea where the hell I'm going with all of this. I thought when I started I had something, but the thing about it is I really don't. I've got nothing, and the thing is if you are reading this, you should probably stop. I venture to say that there are better things out there to be reading. But I guess before I go I just wanted to say that the thing about traditions are that they are always changing. You really can't hold onto the past too tightly because I've found that it crumbles and turns to ashes in your hands.
I guess the only thing that I can really say is thank you, to a good friend, that helped me get through my first Thanksgiving without family.
The thing I was most thankful for..... GUTSGIVING
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