Turkeys and Trivia

              

                I suppose it was making our traditional Thanksgiving oreo turkeys with my grandson Henry that brought back memories of the Thanksgiving trivia class activity I so enjoyed in my developmental English classes at St. Louis Community College.  I had purchased The Thanksgiving Book (1987) and after reading a brief history of the holiday, I thought it would be fun/educational to have a trivia contest and then distribute some of the oreo turkeys (cookies with chocolate icing, Hershey kisses, candy corn and a red hot) as a treat.

                I wish I had kept a copy of the actual trivia questions, but I do remember most of them after taking a fresh look at the Thanksgiving book.  Some of the questions were giveaways, such as name three foods associated with this holiday.  However, many tested our memories of what for me were early lessons about the first Thanksgiving when I was in elementary school.  Here are a few of the actual questions I asked them:

·         What year did the Pilgrims arrive at Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts?     1620

·         Why did these people leave Europe and make a dangerous trip to America?   Religious freedom

·         What was the name of their ship?   Mayflower  

·         When was the first Thanksgiving and why was it a special meal?   In 1621, after only 50% of the settlers survived the winter, Governor Bradford called for a three-day feast to celebrate the harvest with the Indians who helped them

·         How did the Indians help them?    They taught them to plant corn and squash, to fish and hunt

·         Name two people among those first colonists:  John Smith, Squanto, Pocahontas, etc.

·         When did football become the official Thanksgiving sport?    1880s

·         What President established the holiday as an annual, fixed holiday?   President Lincoln declared the 4^th Thursday for the annual national holiday, proclaiming, “Thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens.”  (l863)

·         List three traditional Thanksgiving foods.

  I wouldn’t have been able to answer all these questions correctly,  but some students had really low scores.  The activity was for fun, but  I think It also was an opportunity to remind these students that there was more to Thanksgiving than getting together to eat too much, visit, and watch television.  I suggested they take these facts to their gatherings and impress everyone  with all they knew about the holiday and its history. 

                I must have given some prize to the students with the most correct answers, but I am sure every student was offered an oreo turkey.  Only a few students in one class used a few of these like hockey pucks to toss across the room.  Not one of my more impressive groups.  Most students reacted quite favorably. 

                Many things have changed since I enjoyed those trivia contests with my classes.  However,  being reminded of the risks those first settlers took for that chance for freedom in a new world is worth remembering and shouldn’t change.  And making oreo turkeys remains an annual Thanksgiving activity from generation to generation in our family.  One can never have enough chocolate whatever the occasion!

Yes, God Friended Me

                What happens when an old white woman pulls out of her street one Wednesday morning and notices a young Black man sporting dreadlocks carrying four or five bright yellow bags of supplies and a big jug of juice on the sidewalk just ahead?  Almost sounds like a set-up for a joke, doesn’t it?  However, this is no joke but the beginning of a real life experience that could qualify for at least one story line in an episode of the new television show called “God Friended Me.”

                This show has three, young, main characters, one white, one black and one Indian, plus God, an unseen presence sending friend notifications via Facebook to the professing atheist in the group.  Once the atheist yields to accepting the friend requests, he becomes an amazing participant in God’s providential plans to bless these “friends,” all people in need.  The plot lines almost seem contrived, yet the Bible does present a God who indeed orders lives providentially for His good purposes for them and for the “common good.”  I also buy into this picture of a loving God because I have been the grateful recipient of such divine ordering.

                Back to the old white woman and the young black man’s encounter on a sunny, pleasant summer day.  I am the old white woman who is not in the habit of offering people rides although I have spotted a lady who regularly walks to her job at County Market and given her a chance to ride instead.  This time when I lowered the window and summoned the walker, he looked a bit surprised but put his bags in the back and then got in the front with me.  Although he lived only a few blocks down the road, by the time I dropped him off I had discovered he was the person I had been praying for to help me with some yard work and other little jobs at my duplex. 

                Actually, I had been becoming a bit impatient with the Almighty about a new source of help after Izabella, a student/worker at the EIU Rec Center, finished her degree and went back to Chicago.  She and I had become friends over the few months she assisted me; I even took her to dinner to celebrate her graduation before she left.  Thinking that connection had worked well, I was canvassing the staff at the Rec center when the fall semester began.  But Brandon, my God-ordained new friend, was a surprisingly good match.  He and his 13 year old son have both come to the house now and one is kind and helpful.  LeVante could not have been nicer even when he was doing the main work to clean out my large garbage and recycling containers.  This is also a family who needs some extra money even though both mom and dad work.  I love to watch how God matches people’s needs and desires.

                So, was it divine ordering that put me on the same street at the same time this nice young man would be “walking errands” for his family?  I feel certain such timing was working out God’s answer to my appeals for help.  God may not work through friend requests from Facebook; after all, His ways are higher and better than ours.  But, just as “God Friended Me” portrays a God who providentially works in lives to bring goodness and blessing to needy people, so does the God in the real world who hears and answers our prayers—eventually.