A couple of weeks ago, Jumbo Foods reported a woman left the store with a shopping cart of unpaid groceries with an estimated value of $413.88. (Eighty-eight cents is an estimate?)

Then I got to wondering what the heck she had in there. Can you get $413.88 worth of groceries in one cart? Was it all steaks and imported olives? Was it diapers and cigarettes? Was it 32 bottles of Pepcid and all the birthday cards off the rack? Why, I don’t think I’ve ever come close to ... wait a minute! Oh yes I have! I believe it’s called the Thanksgiving trip to the grocery store.

Every now and then you hear about some way to prepare a Thanksgiving meal for a typical family of four for some outrageously small amount of money. That has to involve serving “recommended” portion sizes and no leftovers, dessert or mixed nuts. We have a chart in our cafeteria at school that compares proper portion sizes to common objects like: 1 cup of cereal is about the size of a fist; 1 cup cooked rice or pasta is equivalent to the size of half a baseball (half!); 1 oz. of cheese looks about like four stacked dice (Not like the ones you hang on your rearview mirror!); 3 oz. of meat should be no bigger than a deck of cards; 2 tablespoons of peanut butter is about the size of a ping pong ball. You might as well eat a fist, half a baseball, four dice and a ping pong ball for all the enjoyment you’d get out of those portions!

Even though the cost of a real holiday dinner is daunting, we’ll spring for it. The cost of Thanksgiving is the least draining thing about the day anyway. For women of America, and maybe about five men in the continental United States who might be in charge of the festivities, it’s a long day of stress and duress. In fact, I’ve dedicated a whole poem to the goings on of Thanksgiving Day, and it goes like this:



Hey Mom, is the

Turkey Done Yet?



Thanksgiving Day, so over-rated,

As far as I’m concerned,

What with keeping the relatives under control,

While making sure nothing gets burned.



Not to mention the fact that you,

Prob’ly had to plan the whole thing,

And decide upon the menu,

And tell others what to bring.



Then shop for the needed stuff,

Without taking out a loan,

And handling the preparations,

For a day you can’t postpone.



The crack of dawn is when you’re up,

a-runnin’ you hit the floor,

and tackle ’em two at a time,

each and every chore.



Mashed potatoes up to your elbows,

Cranberries staining your hands,

While the rest of the happy family,

Romps in the hinterlands.



Maintaining your patience and calm,

Letting nothing get you upset,

’til some football fan from the other room yells,

“Hey Mom, is the turkey done yet?”



For all the toil and trouble involved in pulling off Thanksgiving, it’s still a special time. A time to pause and give thanks — for our families, our friends, our freedom. And, hey, let’s give a little shout out to those unheralded heroes among us who rise before dawn to chip out the partially frozen innards of that wet, slippery, naked, headless turkey, on this cold and special November morn!



Peck is a local mother and grandmother who works in Enid Public Schools. She can be reached at peckaroonie@yahoo.com.