Happy Thanksgiving

I hope everyone’s Thanksgiving went well. This year, I feel blessed and most definitely thankful. It was this time last year, our turkey dinner that we ordered from a different store than either Boston Market or Jewel. My mom found some other place. She finds doing this simpler than doing everything from scratch and saves time. Well, it didn’t taste as good. In fact, there was no instructions on how to reheat anything.  The dinner didn’t even taste good. Everything was horrible. This isn’t the only thing that went wrong that night.

Earlier in the week, my father thought he was catching the flu and on top of that was feeling sore in his legs which he attributed to helping my brother out with some remodeling of his house. While we were having dinner, we kept asking him if he wanted anything  and we were noticing that he was having problems hearing. He was also grumpy but then again who isn’t when they don’t feel good and anything you do seems fruitless. Throughout dinner, he kept moving from sofa to chair and back to sofa only to find some way to be comfortable. Nothing was working. To top it all off, he refused to go to the hospital. He tried to call his doctor and left messages. By, the time dinner was over, he became quiet but still in pain. I remember after my brother and sister-in-law and their little boy went home, my mom was commenting on how my dad was acting and how stubborn he can be. I said just go in and tell him we’re going to the ER and that’s that. She didn’t really want to do that. Sometime later, my mom called me and said they were heading to the ER. A couple of hours later, I try to get hold of her and when I finally did. She was upset and wanted us there. It turns out that as they arrived at the ER, my father was losing the ability to talk. The doctors and nurses were assuming he was having a stroke. They did tests and turns out it wasn’t a stroke. We were grateful about that but after some testing, they found out he had meningitis. It turned out to be a long fight for my dad. He spent a majority of the month of December including Christmas in the hospital. It was a depressing holiday time last year for both Thanksgiving and Christmas. At least for Christmas, we knew what was wrong with him. It just felt like his body wanted to take its sweet time getting better.

Did this Thanksgiving seem any different from last year? Yes, it was. We enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner from Mariano’s. My little girl got to enjoy it more since she got to play not only with her cousin but with grandpa or who she lovingly calls ba-ba. This year, I am definitely thankful that I still have my father and she got to have a wonderful time spending it with him since last year she couldn’t.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!