Alone at Thanksgiving

Yesterday I received an e-mail from a fellow camper here in St. Augustine who was wondering if there was going to be a gathering of rvers anywhere to celebrate Thanksgiving. She mentioned that she and her husband are visiting this area and have no family here. I wrote back that I wasn't aware of any such gathering, since most campgrounds offer a dinner for their own campers where the staff fixes the turkey and dressing and the campers bring a dish to share. But her e-mail reminded me that not all people are comfortable being away from home on the holidays.

There have been a lot of Thanksgiving dinners in my life. I have celebrated with my birth family and shared Thanksgiving with in-laws. The first time I cooked a Thanksgiving dinner was a disaster shared with my first set of in-laws; I didn't defrost the turkey thoroughly and so it wasn't cooked through by the time all the rest of my dinner was ready (and I couldn't figure out why at first). That year I was thankful for Mom and Pop being so understanding and kind by acting as if it was the best dinner they ever tasted. There were Thanksgivings when I had to work a midnight shift and then put a full meal for the family on the table. The first Thanksgiving without my father. Enjoying a gourmet Thanksgiving dinner at my sister-in-law's home. The list goes on.

But since we've been on the road Thanksgiving has been different at our "house". The first year we hit the road as fulltimers we left the campground in Myrtle Beach and drove to Savannah, Georgia (and I can't even remember why we chose to travel on Thanksgiving Day). So our dinner that night was spaghetti since I had no time to cook a feast after traveling several hours. Denny and I agreed that it felt weird not to be eating the traditional turkey dinner but it also made us realize how different our life was going to be from this point on because we no longer had to follow the old traditions. Dinner could be what we liked, when we liked it.

The pictures above this post were taken at the Rocky Comfort Plantation Campground in Warrenton, Georgia several years ago. Our stay there is one of our most memorable simply because we were the only people at the campground. There is no office, no clubhouse, no bathhouse at this campground, just long full hook up sites in a beautiful treed setting in the middle of nowhere. You dropped your campground fees in a mailbox on the property. There were no security lights so at night it was so dark there you literally could not see your hand in front of your face when you went outside. It was peaceful, it was quiet and it didn't bother us a bit that we were alone on Thanksgiving--it was simply another wonderful memory to add to so many others we share.

So while I sympathize with the lady who longed for company on Thanksgiving, I'm thankful that Denny and I have family who accepts our lifestyle and allows us to live our dream. I know that in Ohio and New York our family members will be sitting down to nice dinners, making their own memories and they'll think of us as we're thinking of them on this day. And we're content.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all.