Thanksgiving came early

We broke a lot of traditions with our thanksgiving celebration this year. There was no turkey. There wasn’t even a chicken (a whole one at least). The dishes were not planned out and coordinated (and hence it was a somewhat odd conglomeration of food). I didn’t make my grandma’s famous rolls. We ate off of transformer paper plates (left over from a birthday party) on top of a fall leaf tablecloth. We celebrated on the wrong day.

And honestly? None of those traditions mattered too much this year.

What mattered was the family…and I mean family in every sense of the word except genetics…sharing a table together for the last time.  We’re a group of people brought together from all corners of the States, from various walks of life and with greatly varying personalities. But for a season the Father saw fit to bring each of us together to love and live life and serve alongside each other.

And while there are moments when we drive each other bonkers, there’s a deep love and a unity in purpose that covers those moments.

So we sat. And ate. And talked. And laughed. Laughed a lot…that’s one of the things we do best.

And several hours later, in the wee hours of the morning before the sun peeked over the horizon, table cleared and dirty dishes stacked in the kitchen, we came together again. This time to pack a large pile of luggage (imagine moving a family of five across the ocean in suitcases) and five dearly loved people in a van bound for the airport. Needless to say, there’s a bit of a gaping hole left around these parts today. A hole that we will attempt to fill (or at least ignore) with a team trip to Shenyang tomorrow. Because there’s nothing like good coffee and pizza for drowning your sorrows in.