I grew up on a farm where a variety of animals roamed the farmyard to rival Old MacDonald's menagerie.
Certain realities occur a bit earlier when growing up on a farm, one of which is that it isn’t smart to become attached to or treat the animals like pets, because at some point in the circle of life, those animals may very well become sustenance.
I had not fully learned this lesson when my dad gave me two baby goats. I promptly named them King Lear and Shakespeare (I know, I was a weird kid,😉) and accepted the responsibility of feeding them with a glass Grape Nehi soda bottle fitted with a rubber nipple. They were all gangly legs and high-pitched throaty “nee” sounds, and followed right behind me everywhere I went.
They were a little less cute as summer wore on, as their appetites turned to cherished books I had been reading under the maple tree and shoes I'd abandoned on the ditch bank, kicked off for wading, but King Lear and Shakespeare were still more pet than farm animal, so when Thanksgiving approached, and the two goats disappeared, my father reminded me that animals “come and go” on the farm.
I had learned not to befriend the chickens, which wasn’t hard because they tended to peck, nor Hamlet the pig, because I’d seen the packages of bacon in the freezer, but who would eat a goat?
My father kindly explained that the two families who had helped with the fall harvest were packing up to move to the next area where a harvest would begin in warmer climates to the south, and they had asked about buying the goats. “They didn’t have much, Honey. I knew it would mean several dinners for them, so I gave the goats to them.”
“Do people really eat goats?” I’d asked.
“If that’s what will fill their children’s tummies, they do.”
Now, the family across the street raised turkeys who aggressively charged across the road in a chaotic gobbling fervor to roost atop our car. I didn’t mind knowing that those mean turkeys would end up as roasted centerpieces for Thanksgiving tables, but the goats?
My dad gently explained that all around the world food sources were different from ours. That people ate what they could grow, or what could be found where they live, and where the two families were from, goat was just as normal as turkey for a feast.
My father taught me much more that day than how the food chain worked. He taught me about parents who work hard to feed their hungry children. He taught me that the people of this planet, despite their endless array of uniqueness, have far more in common. He also taught me that the people mattered most - not the food they ate.
So, when I took my place at our Thanksgiving table that year and ate the foods that had long been tradition for our family, I didn’t think about the goats. I thought about the people gathering around the table with me. And when my tummy was full of mashed potatoes and stuffing and warm buttery rolls, I hoped that wherever they were, those families had full bellies, too.
As an adult, there have been times when that discussion with my dad comes back to me. Yesterday was such a day. As I worked to prepare the traditional Thanksgiving dishes for my family that my mother prepared for me and her mother prepared for her, I heard Dad’s words, “It's not about the food. It’s about the people.” I remembered the year when my eldest son was serving a mission in Germany and a kind family offered him Christmas rat. I thought about my younger son's time serving in Palermo, where they often taught free English classes which were usually filled with refugees from northern Africa. In one lesson, a man was struggling to express himself, and he said, "You know banana?" And my son answered, "Yes! I know banana." And then, after finding common ground, they could continue. Food can be so different, but is universally essential to life.
Many of you know that I work with people who live across the world, people whose cultural traditions are different from mine, people whose faith systems are different from mine. People who may think my food choices strange (the concept of green bean casserole is a hard thing to explain.) The funny thing about differences? They disappear when you forget to look for them.
This planet is populated with people who have families. People who work to fill the bellies of their children. People who work hard to make a better life for their communities. People of integrity and wit and brilliance who make this world so much better.
Life is fragile. Natural disasters strike without warning. Governments go to war. Tyrants reign with terror. If our view of the strife happens to be from afar, it can be easy to choose a side according to what we so distantly see. But if we look closely, past the governments, past the tyrants, past the rhetoric, we will see what’s important. People. People just like us.
This Thanksgiving, I am praying we will all look across the table at the incredible people we find there.
I am praying for those people.
For those who mourn.
For those who ache.
For those who hunger.
For those who worry.
For those who are weary.
Youngsters who are prone to textspeak use GOAT as an acronym for Greatest Of All Time.
In that sense, I pray that this Thanksgiving is a GOAT Thanksgiving for each of you, that your table is surrounded by people you love, and your belly is filled with the foods that bring you comfort, even if it's goat.
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