Thanksgiving....a long, long time ago

Photo of Dad

I watched him prepare to carve the beautiful, brown turkey. I'd seen him do it many Thanksgivings and Christmases, we had turkey for both, but this was one of the last we were together as a family. In a couple of years, as it turned out, his satellite office in Atlanta moved to the headquarters in Oklahoma and my two oldest brothers stayed in Atlanta to finish college. My youngest brother moved to Oklahoma with us during the corporate transfer, but went straight to freshman year in college--so really--we went from a family of six to a family of three, overnight. It was a tough decision for Mom and Dad to leave (or allow) my brothers to stay in Atlanta--and one they agonized over for years afterwords.

"Do mom and dad ever talk about us," one brother from Atlanta asked while visiting. "Only all the time," I said. "It's like I'm hardly even here."