It's the Noise by Liz Flaherty

Thanksgiving will be a week from today. It will be a day when I think of the family members who are no longer with us, because Thanksgiving was always such a family day, often spent in Aunt Nellie's basement when I was a kid and in different homes as the years passed. We never had a matriarch who always did the turkey and bossed the kitchen. Mostly we had ... well ... noise. 

The women would be in the kitchen, all talking at once. I was young enough that I neither knew nor cared what they were talking about. The men would be in the living room talking about farming or their workplace. If it was after dinner, a few of them would be snoring.

The kids were all over the place. Little girls playing with dolls, boys playing board games or the 78 rpm records on Aunt Nellie's Victrola, teenage girls staying away from the younger ones. They'd sit together at a table and talk in low tones and compare lipstick shades. Sometimes their voices would drop to a whisper and everyone would know the subject was ... shh ... boys.

Things were never exactly like this after I grew up. I missed Aunt Nellie's house, the Victrola, and the cousins. But then, new places, people, and traditions took their place. We had our own kids, who in turn married and had their own. We seldom all make it on holidays, because our family is spread far and wide. 

But, even though I'm the oldest cook in the family, my son-in-law usually does the turkey--yay! My daughter-in-law roasts the best vegetables in the oven. My other daughter-in-law is the pie queen and my daughter makes cookies and deviled eggs. Lots of both. I just fill in where there are any blank spots. 

The TV with football is on in the corner, teenagers are gaming in front of the one in the basement. We're all talking and laughing, eating cookies, and drinking wine. Later in the afternoon, some of us converge at the mostly cleared table to play games.

We make a lot of noise, and even though not much else is the same, the kind of noise it is is just as perfect as it was then. Just as inviting. The separation by gender doesn't happen as much now, if for no other reasons than our houses are more wide open; we don't have walls between our kitchen areas and our living rooms. At our Thanksgiving celebrations, we don't seem to have generational walls, either. I love that. I love being with family, period, and it is my greatest gratitude of all. 

Wishing you the happiest and noisiest of Thanksgivings!

Available now! A story from the Christmas Town series and a special bonus read!

Amazon: https://a.co/d/5InLKmJ

Everywhere else: https://books2read.com/u/4j6G92

When Ellie Griffith comes to Christmas Town, Maine, to sell socks, her overachieving family accuses her of running away and extending her lifelong habit of never finishing anything she starts. In her heart, broken by being left nearly at the altar, she thinks they’re probably right, but she has to try one more time. The last thing she wants to do is meet a man. Patrick Nolan, the seasick-prone, dyslexic son of a fisherman and a librarian, owns a Christmas tree farm outside of Christmas Town. He’s grown used to being the family disappointment and loves the direction his life has gone. He’d like to have a family of his own, but his history of rushing into relationships has left him gun-shy about love. But then the manager of the new sock store slips on the ice right in front of him. Maybe, just maybe, the stories of magic in Christmas Town are true.