Thanksgiving Conversation

As Thanksgiving approaches, so too the discussions that will occur around the dinner table. The health of a loved one. Catching up on family lore—both true and mythical—and contemporary news. The latter is dangerous territory, particularly when politics enters the discussion. Better to enjoy the tender meat of a well prepared turkey than to consume the bitterness of buzzards picking at divisive issues. Yet Thanksgiving may be the rare time all your chicks gather in the coop. It is a good time to “dispense wisdom,” as my military colleagues would say.

So, what should be discussed and how? Consider this. Many families this year dispatched a loved one off to college. It’s a risky proposition insomuch as it will have been the first time your children have been sent into the jaws of a hedonistic monster otherwise known as “the college experience.” Parents can only hope that they have blued their youngsters with a protective coating of virtue and maturity to heed the voices of their better angels to focus on what the college experience should be: intellectual education, not social justice agitation or adolescent antics that may involve both strong drink and illegal drugs. 

Even the strongest children are not immune to temptation. As many parents of young adults have come to know, it’s hard to share wisdom with people who think they know everything having escaped the daily supervision of high school. The response is often predictable. “Please, (mom or dad) I don’t need a lecture.”  Yet, there are some things that they should hear at their Thanksgiving break. How to dispense that wisdom is as important as the words used to do so. I would suggest a proverbial approach that is some short and clear advice administered not by the tongue but by the pen. Here are a few ideas.

1. Your college experience is for serious-minded learning to prepare you for life after college. Activities that interfere with attending classes, studying, and building on newly acquired knowledge to prepare for the next level of studies is a waste of tuition money.
2. Your greatest impact on your peers is your ability to work diligently, demonstrate maturity, and avoid distraction from the purpose of college. They may think you are a geek now, but later they will see you were quite wise. 
3. If you become “one of the crowd,” you may be popular, but little more than that.
4. You did not become an adult when you moved away. But you did move to an adult environment. Act that way and with acting comes practice, and with practice, attainment.
5. Your parents love you for the person you are. Honor that love by showing them the adult you can be.
6. When you are about to do or say something, ask yourself, “Would I want to see a description of what I am doing or saying posted on my parents refrigerator door?”   
7. If you wouldn’t do something in the full light of day, why do it at night?
8. Don’t eat, drink and be merry. Try being nutritious, sober, and physically fit. 
9. You are not smarter than your professors. But you can be.
10. Write real letters home, not emails. Take out a piece of paper. Scribble a weekly letter that will take you maybe 10 minutes. Place it in an envelope. Buy a stamp. Place it on the envelope and then put the letter in a mailbox. Your parents will cherish it more than diamonds. 
11. Turn off your cell phone when you go to bed. Sleeping at night is better than sleeping in class.
12. Remember Proverbs 3:5-6. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.”

Warning: if you dispense this with your tongue at the dinner table, do not be surprised when (1) eyes roll, (2) mocking or off-topic conversations break out or (3) you get the “Oh, dad/mom” exasperated routine. Your children do not want a lecture over their otherwise relaxing meal. Besides, as you know, teens know everything and will hasten to remind you of that when you attempt to lecture them. Nevertheless, they need to hear from you as much as you need to share with them. Even at 72, I remain a parent to my children.

So, try this. Take these points, add your own, tending to the positive and share it with them as a letter to read after dinner or later. When they do, they may surprise you with a quiet “thanks.” And that will be the best “thanks” that you receive this Thanksgiving season.

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