Written by Rocky Saxbe, Mechanicsburg, Ohio

It’s a cold and damp Sunday. Rain patters on the bunkhouse roof, and the fire in the wood stove begins to warm the room. Suzy and I have escaped to the Lakehouse as the COVID-19 pandemic is sweeping the country and the world. Governor DeWine has ordered a statewide curfew, and we prepare for a lonely Thanksgiving without family or friends.  People are warned not to travel. Families are discouraged from gathering for the traditional turkey dinner. The grim death toll in America from the virus has exceeded 1000 daily for months. Today is also the 57th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas. Meanwhile, our current President, defeated on November 3rd by more than 6 million votes, defiantly refuses to concede and deliberately works to sabotage our nation’s long and honored commitment to a peaceful transfer of power.

I stand at my Dad’s upright desk made for him by his friend General E.R. Quesada in 1974. The desk stood in the U.S. Attorney General’s office and then for years in his Mechanicsburg office. The souvenirs, trophies, photographs, and furniture surrounding me in this small room trigger vivid memories of past Thanksgivings that were special times for Suzy and me.  So on this dark and melancholy morning, I’ve decided to record some of those better times and a couple of not-so-good ones.

President Kennedy’s death in 1963 cast a black shroud over that year’s celebration, but most of our Thanksgivings have been joyous occasions where our families came together and gave thanks for our good fortune and love for each other.  We shared bountiful meals, except in 1973 when Suzy’s brother Steve promised to supply the turkey for the Sloan/Saxbe feast in Bexley. He did, but on that crucial day, he showed up with a frozen twenty-pounder. Any effort to thaw and roast it was fruitless. Billie Sloan’s housekeeper finally announced to the disappointed and hungry crowd, which included my folks, “That turkey is colder than Nixon’s heart.”

When I was a high school senior, I spent the night before Thanksgiving partying at a friend’s house in Columbus. After oversleeping the following day, I raced to Mechanicsburg for the family dinner that ended several hours earlier. Mom cried when I walked in and said Dad wanted to see me in his shop, called “the gun house.” He was hot and ripped me for being inconsiderate, selfish, and unworthy of their support. He informed me that the army would straighten me out and that I didn’t deserve to enjoy the unrestricted freedom I had abused. Fortunately, his anger burned out, and I missed going to the army.

My absence that year was matched decades later by Jake, ever careless about punctuality. He was to fly home from his job in California to join the family gathering. We paid for his ticket and continually pestered him to make his flight on time. Jake’s procrastination caused him to be booked on the last possible flight to get home. He almost made it, but like me in 1964, he stayed up all night partying in LA. He made it to Phoenix but fell asleep in the terminal, missing the plane to Columbus. Jake finally arrived on Friday to cold turkey and an even colder reception.

Speaking of cold, I spent two Thanksgivings when there was no one there. In 1962, Mom and Dad were in Europe, Bart and Juli were away at school, and I was by myself in Mechanicsburg - not even a turkey. In 1970, I was in Japan on a temporary assignment with the Marines and ate my turkey at the Atsugi Naval Air Station officers’ club. Fortunately, the base had one of the best bars in the Far East with a traditional Japanese hot bath nearby; Good scotch, a hot tub, and rub sufficed.

Suzy and I have celebrated our Thanksgivings in a variety of locales: Jubarock, the Lakehouse, Suzy’s folks, or Sarah and Andy’s. When we lived in Washington, D.C., we shared Thanksgiving dinner with our good friend, Mark Cline, and his girlfriend also named Susie. That was when my Suzy came close to getting a tattoo on her shoulder, and that’s another story.

Most Thanksgivings saw us gathering for a delicious feast around a table with all the family and fixins. Suzy’s Mom always had an extra plate for someone who had nowhere else to go. It could be a friend of Steve or Suzy’s, or Fanny, the lady from the meat counter at Martin’s Kosher Food Market. I remember Billie’s noodle kugel was a regular treat like my Mom’s oyster dressing and tomato aspic, which I ate but abhorred.

Dinners at my house always occurred at an unusual hour in the mid-afternoon. How that tradition began, I don’t know. Maybe it had to do with allowing time for the stomach-busting meal to digest, so we could catch a new movie or meet friends home from school. But when I was younger, it allowed sleeping in, recovery from the night before, and participating in a morning Turkey Bowl touch football game with the Larrimer boys.

When Sarah was seven months old, we stayed at Roosevelt House, the Ambassador’s Residence in New Delhi, India. Thanksgiving dinner there was unlike any other we had experienced. There were no preparations, no cooking, and no dishes to wash - just the splendor of being served on silver trays by white-gloved staff.

Our 2014 Thanksgiving in Mechanicsburg was especially meaningful because it brought our families together as one - The Sloan’s, Saxbe’s, and Bartz’s. We gathered at the Van Darby Club, where some family members met for the first time.

On Thursday, Suzy and I will add another Thanksgiving story to those I’ve recorded above and the many others I can’t recall. Because of Covid, it’s just us for the first time in our long marriage and love affair. But thanks to modern technology, we’ll join our family in Columbus and Austin by Zoom, having filled our bellies with turkey and hearts with gratitude for our many blessings.