Peeling Potatoes

As I was peeling potatoes and preparing a roast with carrots a few hours ago, it got me to thinking about how many families on an Autumn Sunday afternoon have this family meal on any given Sunday in America.


Those thoughts take me back to my memories as a young girl, and just this meal that I'm about to share, has given me an appreciation of life lessons.  Lesson number one, my Mom taught me how to cook!


When my brother and I were kids, it was a Sunday ritual that we would come home from church and I would peel the potatoes and carrots.  Sometimes, if Mom thought we were famished, we would layer the whole meal in the pressure cooker(ya, ya, for kids that don't know what this is, google it!) and voile', we were eating in an hour! However, most of the time, we waited for it to slow cook in the Crock Pot.  


As my beautiful Mom would start tenderizing the roast and doctoring it up with seasonings, I would watch her and learn how to cook a meal in fours hours or less!  And she didn't even have to do anything except prepare it!  I know, I know, sometimes as a kid, you're thinking, "not roast again!"  But the sad reality is, how many of those families that I've been thinking of this afternoon, has thought about the same family rituals and wish they could have them back?


With the hard economic times we're living in today, roasting in my Crock Pot made my mind wander as to how many families can't afford to go buy their roast for Sunday dinner.  Or how many families aren't together because Mommy or Daddy  are in Afghanistan, Iraq or another part of the world fighting for our freedoms or another countries freedom?  Or how many of them aren't coming home and are Hero's now because they sacrificed their own lives?


As the day passes, and I eventually start smelling the aroma of a great home cooked meal, I will give thanks for the men and women who have surrendered their own liberties to fight for mine.  I will pray for the families who can't afford to have a roast for Sunday dinner, and I will give thanks to God for taking care of me and my family.  We are truly BLESSED!  Because.............I'm lucky enough to eat my roast and potatoes and share it with my Mom tonight!