Show yesteryear S feast days Q caly LAURETTA JOY 1 caid ES father it went off all tight but it like our thanksgiving when the children were home and mother and grandmother mother bell winked back a sentimental tear there were only two of them at the supper table with its dabs of cold chicken and pork cranberry sauce celery nuts cold squash quash and all the orthodox remnants of the great american feast the tour four children and twelve grandchildren had been feasted and feted in the hie old home and had gone cone on their way rejoicing after the girls had helped mother do up the work the bouse where tom and bob and ruth and alice had been born where they had bad been fed and kissed and spanked where they had scrapped and made up and manifested the first sparks of the genius within them was very still gull yes les mother it like the old Than thanksgivings givings said the man with most of the perkiness ness of youth gone and they were silent together the mother was remembering those long ago years jeara when a home full of childish joy in thanksgiving or any holiday gave it a freshness and vigor that had bad dulled in later years she le the warm house wrapped in winter snows bubbling over with the zestful enthusiasm of childhood first of all there wa was their thear keen joy in the distant vague preparations for the holiday she could see toms grin when she sent him to the store for raisins and citron 0 and almonds and the smiles of all of them anen the big rich cake m aas as put in the old oil brown crock there was the day when ruth and bob came home with their pieces to speak in school the day before thanksgiving and joyfully revealed eve aled that teacher had told them what they had bad known all along that school would close on wednesday night and they have to come back until monday and then their watchful fearful waiting for the first snowflakes and tom getting out his big coaster and painting the runners and alice and ruth going to the woods for bittersweet and partridge berries and sprays of evergreen and decorating the mantel AM windows and archways arch ways and then W h dy day before when father tilled killed ald dressed the chickens or turkey fir ir duck and what a hurry burry and hughe there was wa of ct cleaning baking ing and boiling and how bow golden big kitchen was with the winter SUB lancing glancing through the maples outside and how bow warm warin it was with the tha big oven sending out waves of and the odor of baking pie cake caka and j cookies cookie and then the treat pet p et day Itself no 00 need beed to call hr brood that day for snow now had bad come in the night and the boys boy hal risen with the ilary flery red winter sun un to try out the sled before breakfast and had come in all cold and rosy roay to gulp down pancakes pancake and barup and eggs and bacon and then no matter how bow great the feint feast nor bow much remained rem olied to be done the six of them were dressed in sunday best and the family trailed down the white street to church meeting neighbors neighbor on the way smiling chatting asking whether it was wa a turkey or a chicken bill of fare thin time growing soberer an aa they trailed into the little white church and down to the pew that held the six alx of them each sabbath Bab bath and then the triumphant byron and pani from I 1 the choir the sermon of plenty from the pastor and the yellow winter sun streaming through the stained windows the benediction the moment of chat and good will from neighbor to neighbor a little herd guided down doan the steps where they burst from church sobriety into the puppy spirits demanded by a cold snappy day home again and the last scramble for the feast the girls setting the table with the best linen silver and china with a bowl of tiny yellow chrysanthemums from the backyard bush the trips down cellar for a can of relish tiny firm arm pickles some chill sauce strawberries and the squash and carrots and turnips and potatoes and onions each with its lt part to play la in the feast the turkey or duck stuffed with dressing was crackling away in the oven father was out in the garden exhuming some celery put to bleach for the occasion a month or so ago the boys were cracking nuts and polishing apples how sweet it was to do her work in her own place for those who needed end and enjoyed this work how serene and sure and peaceful it all seemed looking back over those years all the doubts and torments of later years seemed impossible how had it come about what had life done to her jo to them her friends her neighbors thought that life had used her kindly death had never knocked at the door of her fold fohl sickness had been almost unknown in the eyes of the world her children had bad turned out well tom was councilman in a big city and a prominent business attorney be H had married a nice girl and no one could ask for prettier better mannered grandchildren than this family had given her alice bad married a physician and was prominent socially and la in club work mother and father bell rarely picked up a sunday paper without seeing a picture of mrs john graham or one or other of the little grahams grahame who were included among those prominent in the juvenile set bel bob was a successful merchant and active la in furthering employee welfare work ruth had bad never married but was more than successful is as a home decorator she sha traveled all she wanted to dressed beautifully maintained a charming apartment was invited to the homes of those whom the world calls great no there was not one of ber children who had not done well weir or was anything but a credit to the parents and yet why did a mother hunger so BO even if her children were all that she had bad ever hoped tor for them why must heartaches and loneliness be the price to pay for this very success sl why did such a sense of baffled puzzlement fill her at the abi thanksgiving table why did their coming not satisfy why did tills this longing for the other days persist in seizing her she knew the answer knew that their very success their vei very ry homes their very children meant that her work was done it was but a visit of a day mid and as such bad no DO faint eat connection 1 I 1 77 with the yesteryear feast days day which meant one home one interest one working and playing niche for all she and their father and their home made up their lifts lifes J then them today they are making those grooves tor for others and finding their own therein there are thousands of fathers and mothers the country over who find end only poignant loneliness lonell and even bitterness in a repetition of ef the feast days day which were so 0 o joyful in days day gone cone by the winter sun still streams through the backyard maples maple into the big kitchen the same game old range bait bakes es the turkey an and if squash and mines mince and pumpkin plea pies for the same old brood the same barue china and silver and best tablecloth may be upon the dining room table but bot ing ine la is not wh what at it was even if the sam am faces facea with no break in the ranks rank are grouped about the table it li Is all different now they are guests greita in the place where they were common workers work en they are strangers it la in the home that gave eava them birth does doe life bold no other job for those who gave BT them forth to the world arldt this to te the question that wis the lonely hearts of many a mother and father bell Is there any balm for these parents who feel that lifes twilight must be spent with folded hands bands thinking of the active life that Is 1 over obert or in I 1 it the old story of paying the price for everything which one attains in life I 1 think not I 1 think its a matter of perverted viewpoint in the drat brat place parents who conclude that their lifes work la Is over jut just because their children are grown and away from home are only writing their own doom life Is not static it li is ever flowing the water goes on over the mill wheel and he be who seeks to hold bold it back will be able to scoop up op only a pall or so and keep it until it grows scummy many parents are like this the waters of their own lives flow on oa deeply and smoothly and when a stretch of clear sparkling limpid water which means a phase of living especially dear to them comes along the parents scoop it up and seek to bold it forgetting that the th e tall mill I 1 Is going on just the same parenthood Is ia an essentially dear phase of living to most people nature has a vital reason for this but sho she does her job too well one Is inclined to think that it if she had created a man or woman so that child rearing would be the one job they craved during the days of their youth but would so maks make them that they would crave another job when the children were grown and going about their own job of parenthood the old dame would have done don a better job then too its a human trait to remember the fair and shining side of things that are gone and hence to repine pine for them to go back to the bell family ruth the single damsel glimpsed her parents mood to the full and discussed it with sith her sister like this think to hear mother rave that she was supremely happy when we were all home and sometimes it makes toe me furious when I 1 distinctly recall how bow she fussed bussed and worried 1 and stewed around about one thing and another where in the world the money for our winter underclothes was coming from how bow much schoolbooks casill what in the world she rould mould do with bobs bad temper and toms toma lying and my vanity and your craziness after the boys and many a time she he made her moan man about how bow overworked and thankless her life was and would the time never como come when she bad a chance to rest and get a little peace and that I 1 it if mother and father bell live to be eighty they look back upon their peaceful serene quiet life together now as a the best of their days and at one hundred they would regard the days day of eighty as a altogether desirable if thanksgiving does doe nothing else for us may it quicken our vision of the glories of the present presen tl I 1 |