Mom had The Gift. So did Dad, only his gift was different from Mom�s. But every Thanksgiving their gifts came together in a wondrous mix of the temporal and the divine.

For Mom, that meant cooking. Mom wasn�t just a good cook; she was an artist. She could take Spam and do things with it that made you wish there really was such a thing as a Spam animal — and that you had been born one. She could turn a pot of beans and a few hot dogs into a dish so extraordinary you thought perhaps you would order beanie-weenies the next time you dined at the Ritz. And her liver and onions . . . trust me. Heaven.

Thanksgiving, then, provided Mom with the perfect canvas for the full palette of her culinary colors. The turkey was hand-basted and stuffed with made-from-scratch dressing. The potatoes — real potatoes — were mashed and covered with her rich stewed chicken gravy. The yams were brown sugar-glazed and covered with enough gooey melted marshmallows to almost make them palatable to a confirmed non-yammer like me. Then there were the homemade rolls, apricot jam, mustard pickles and pumpkin, banana cream and coconut cream pies. It was always incredible — and incredibly good.

Think of her as Michelangelo, and Thanksgiving dinner as her David. Only she created her David every year for more than 40 years.

Dad�s special gift was less appetizing, but it was every bit as much a part of our Thanksgiving tradition. Dad was a praying man. And not your common, ordinary, �now I lay me down to sleep� sort of a praying man. When Dad prayed, angels stopped whatever they were doing to take notes. In my lifetime I�ve heard Dad pray lost dogs home, lost businesses solvent and lost children righteous. He was to praying what Michael Jordan was to dunking. If there wasn�t a God when he started praying, you just knew there�d be one by the time he said �Amen.�

Dad was an articulate man who had a way with a phrase. Folks who did business with him said he could tell you to go to the fiery infernal regions in such a way that you�d look forward to the trip. So when Thanksgiving rolled around and it was time to give thanks for Mom�s latest gastronomical triumph, no one was better suited to the task than Dad. His prayers were always ponderous and profound, but on Thanksgiving they became epic — the Lord�s Prayer Meets �War and Peace.�

What can I say? He had The Gift.