The most difficult days of the year for seniors living alone are often Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Eve/Day. Many people have no family near by, or don't have the ability to go anywhere. They might not drive anymore, or are homebound due to illness. It doesn't have to be this way.
At Ocean Hills, a 55+ community where I have lived for the past 10 years, one new owner, decided to put on a Thanksgiving dinner for any resident that wanted to attend. She really outdid herself. With the help of a great team of volunteers (including me), she cooked all the food, set up 13 tables of 10 each, and threw a Thanksgiving party that all will remember.
There were couples and singles, able bodied and disabled, all there to share a meal with community members that they may or may not know. My mom and I went, and sat at a table with a few people I knew, and many I did not. We shared stories, I found out one of the couples at our table lived on my street, unbeknownst to me. The craziest thing we discovered as we all shared stories, was that of the 10 people at our table, six of them shared a birthday with someone else at the table. My mom found another many who shared her birthday, there were two ladies named Karen who shared a birthday, and two other strangers who also shared a birthday. The odds of that are 1 in 16,000!!!
Anyway, strangers can become friends very quickly over a meal, and that's exactly what happened here, table after table. So many lonely people that seldom get out had a Thanksgiving to remember.
Oftentimes seniors that are isolated, are forgotten. It's so important to remember them, to respect and honor them. When we have so much, it feels wrong to forget them. Thank you, Carol, for putting this Thanksgiving meal together. It meant so much to all of us, but especially to the many residents of our community that would have stayed home alone had it not been for Carol and her wonderful team of volunteers.
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