About four posts ago, I told everyone that my grandmother was ready to transition from this life to the next. Shortly after that post, she did. The original photo I had on that post was a rose but I changed it to the black and white of her above and I was so taken by the photo, I wanted to do a whole blog on it.
As Thanksgiving is tomorrow and this will be my first one without her, her passing has left a void in the traditional Thanksgiving in my family. When my grandfather passed, we were all sad at our feasting table yet we moved on. Then my mother and now my grandmother are all gone and Thanksgiving will never be the same. The mantle of Thanksgiving in my family was steeped in old traditions like most families. Specific foods were always on the table and we looked forward to them each year. Most of them, my grandmother's recipes she knew from heart. They were long and arduous to make but the time and effort paid off as we moaned and groaned and loosened our belts afterwards.
This year, my surviving and dwindling family, consisting of my dad, step mom, aunt and cousins are all I have left. None are having a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. I remember the old days, back when there was no divorce, which was the first blow to my families traditional meals, and my parents, aunt, uncle, cousins, and grandparents would all gather for those holiday gatherings. You'd walk in and the smells of turkey, potatoes and stuffing would smack you straight in the face and the salivary glands would go into overdrive. Of course the kitchen was off limits to us kids and we were banished to the living room until called. Remember the kids table? Ours was a fold up square card table as there was only three kids. I frequently enjoy the memory of those days around the holidays.
As for the pictures above, it was taken at my grandmother's house last year on Thanksgiving. She was 95 years old, in a wheel chair because of a stroke and she always wanted to help clean up after dinner. She would wash dishes from her chair and at this frozen moment in time, I was in the dinning area and I turned to see her bathed in bright sunlight from the window above the sink. As cameras often do, they choose to expose for the bright light or the shadows when they are in auto mode, which I had it in. I zoomed in a bit so the highlights were all you could see and snapped it. I shelved this pic for a year and haven't really done anything with it till today. One year later exactly, editing it and cropping it further, I do so with a heavy heart knowing that our traditional Thanksgiving is gone. The smells, the food, the time together, the fun......
This is why I love photography, this one moment, this 1/320th of one second in my life will always bring me back to that day, Thanksgiving at my grandmothers.
Cherish the memories, build the traditions and love one another.
May we all be thankful in what we have in each other and in God. To God be the Glory!
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