The Resemblance is More Than the Food

We are traveling today.  It isn't quite "over the river and through the woods to Grandmother's house we go," but it is the general idea.  We are gathering with family -- the first of a couple such assemblies over the next few days.  In both cases our physical nexus will be the kitchen and the nearby table -- both involving far more culinary activity than is good for us -- but the familiar recipes will not be the only relevant assets; in fact, they won't even be the most important.  The very fact that the recipes and the gatherings, themselves, have become "traditional" is indication that life has been lived and love has been forged through countless experiences, tiny and immense, that are worth recalling and repeating and sustaining. 

I get sort of misty-eyed when one of the kids calls -- as Christopher did yesterday -- to ask about a certain recipe.  In the absence today of both of their parents, the kids are hosting a Thanksgiving gathering for friends.  Everyone is bringing something to the table, but among the things that my kids are bringing to that table are dishes they have traditionally enjoyed around ours.  I treasure watching those threads get woven into their own chosen traditions.  It gives me some hope that other things from our common life together have found residence in their souls beyond vegetable casseroles and smoked turkeys. 

In all these gatherings and the logistical planning required to schedule and accomplish them, in all the traveling, in all the dirtied pots and pans and the crowded plates and mounded whipped cream, in all the stories retold and experiences remembered and and updates provided, in all the ruffled feathers and knowing glances and in all the parting embraces, we remind ourselves of the awesome, miraculous blessing that we have something to do with one another.  And here, around these tables, convened with families by blood and families by choice,  we remember and comprehend -- even when we might rather be somewhere else, and despite our capacity to get on each others nerves -- our connectedness is a precious and inseparable part of what makes us who we are. 

And we are grateful.  We have other blessings, to be sure -- indeed, our pens have inadequate ink, our tablets inadequate paper, and our days inadequate hours to list and count them.  But the comprehension and affirmation of our relatedness -- that we are more than ourselves; indebted to more than our own efforts; nourished by more than our own gleanings; warmed and encouraged and comforted and cautioned by more than our own embrace -- is almost certainly the richest blessing we can know this side of heaven. 

And the closest resemblance to it.  No wonder scripture's favorite metaphor for it is a banquet.