The Day after Thanksgiving

The Day after Thanksgiving
by Vivian Gilbert Zabel

          When families divide and become mixed, with different households expecting children to take part in festivities for holidays, ideas and plans change. Our two oldest grandchildren, both beautiful girls, had to be with their father and his family on Thanksgiving Day, and with us the day after. Therefore the day after Thanksgiving, I would awaken while it was still dark, poke the turkey in the oven, drive to the other side of Oklahoma City, and pick up two little girls who were still half asleep. Then we would go to the special Christmas sales held in the early morning the day after Thanksgiving each year.

          The first year of the arrangement, two-and-a-half year-old Macayla could just peek over the edge of some of the display tables. The stores, packed to over-flowing, seemed a fairy land to her and her eighteen-month-old sister, Keri.

          As I put Keri in the shopping basket at WalMart, I reminded both girls, “Now you aren’t to touch anything, okay? We’ll find Christmas gifts for everyone.”

          “Mommy, too?” Macayla turned large blue eyes to search my face.

          “Yes, sweetie, Mommy, too.” I bent to lift Macayla to put her into the front of the basket.

          “No, Granny, I wanna walk.”

          “There are too many people. You’ll get lost.” I stared at the tiny girl standing beside me. “Come on, please let me put you in the basket.”

          “I pommiz I won’t. I hold on to here.” She placed one hand on the wire of the basket. “Presents go in the basket.”

          “Okay, but if you turn loose, I will put you in the basket. I certainly don’t want to lose you.” I glanced at Keri, who grinned back.

          “I not be losed,” she announced from her seat.

          We worked our way through the crowds of maddened people. I pushed the basket with one hand while holding on to Macayla with the other. She kept one hand clasped on the metal, but her eyes glowed as they searched the mob around her. Keri pointed and wanted to hold items she saw on display cases we crept by.

          “Now, Keri, we can’t touch things in the store unless we’re going to buy them, remember?”

          Her dark curls bounced as she nodded her head.

          We hit a snarl in the flow of human traffic. We couldn’t move forward, backward, or to either side. I leaned against the handle of the basket but straightened when I saw Macayla turn toward a display table beside us. Her eyes barely reached above the top. She stood gazing a moment before one hand streaked up and grabbed something, bringing it to her chest.

          “Macayla! I told you not to touch anything, sweetie.” I took the fist that clutched an object. “What did you take?”

          “But Granny, you said . . .” Tears glistened on her eyelashes before she hid her face behind long blond hair.

          I bent to tip her chin up. “I said what, sweetie?”

          “You said I can get Mommy a present.” She opened her hand to reveal a broach in the shape of a cat. “Mommy likes kitty cats.”

          “Mommy like kitties,” Keri echoed as I hugged her older sister.

          “Yes, sweetie, your mommy likes kitty cats.” I brushed the tears from her cheeks. “It’s okay. I did tell you that you could get your mommy a present, but from now on, please tell me first before just taking something. Will you do that?”

          The sun broke through as a smile drove the tears away. “Kay.”

          We finished our shopping and were home by eleven. Starting a shopping spree at seven in the morning causes one to finish rather early. At the house, we took all our sacks to the bedroom to wait until later for wrapping. I continued dinner preparations as the rest of the family starting arriving. This day-after-Thanksgiving became our family Thanksgiving, a tradition that would last for nearly sixteen years.

          As football played on the TV screen, we wrapped presents and set up the Christmas tree. Any decorating the girls could do, they did that day and the next. The first year, Keri put every decoration she handled on the same branch of the tree. Then when she turned her back to pick up another, one of her uncles slipped a few off and placed them elsewhere. That branch was a bit crowded, but she loved it.

          “Oooo, pretty.” Keri clapped her hands and beamed at her bowed branch when the twinkling lights brightened the tree.

          As Macayla placed decorations on the tree, we could hear her singing, “Happy Birthday to Jesus. Happy Birthday to Jesus.”

          The story of that day became a family favorite, and the tradition of having the Zabel family Thanksgiving on the day after Thanksgiving and its starting our Christmas season began. The girls are young adults now, and one a mother, the other a mother-to-be. Our traditions have changed as their time became filled with other loves, but in my heart those voices still echo: “I not get losed...”; “But you said . . . Mommy likes kitty cats”; “Oooo, pretty . . .”; “Happy Birthday to Jesus . . .”

          Merry Christmas.