MARK MY WORD: IT'S TOUGH TO BE A TURKEY AT THIS TIME OF YEAR

It's tough to be a turkey at this time of year. Too many people want to gobble you up.

Thanksgiving is a time when Americans give thanks for their blessings and then proceed to eat their way through a ton of the holiday bird.

If Ben Franklin had his way, Americans would be talking turkey all the time. Bill Clinton would be sitting under the sign of the turkey in the Oval Office. Franklin adored the wild turkey, proposing it as the symbol for the new nation.

But it lost out by a single vote in 1782 when the Continental Congress placed the bald eagle on the great seal of the Republic.

Franklin was dismayed. He viewed the bald eagle as a "a bird of bad moral character."But the turkey hasn't been forgotten. We remember him every year at Thanksgiving. We can't imagine having dinner without him.

Besides, what would we do without all those drawings of turkeys that our children bring home from school and day care.

The great thing about a turkey is that you can paint one with your hand. Slap some paint on your hand and press down on a piece of paper and you've got a turkey complete with finger feathers. You couldn't make an eagle that way.

None of this is much consolation for the poor turkey who will be the guest of honor at the family dinner.

They can't count on a presidential pardon. Not anymore. Abe Lincoln's long gone. He once spared the bird fattening on the White House lawn after a tearful plea from his 9-year-old son. But tears only go so far.

It was Lincoln who proclaimed Thanksgiving a national holiday, setting the date in November, during the height of the modern football season.

Turkeys have had a tough life, but many of them have managed to survive the holiday and the humiliation of having people dress up as turkeys at football games.

Turkeys won't get any frequent-flyer miles. But experts say they can out-sprint a race horse. Of course, you'd be running too if you were slated to be the main entree.

This time of year there is more to Thanksgiving than the bird. There's the matter of cleaning up your house so it's presentable for family visitors.

Joni and I recently went on a marathon cleaning binge, tackling the mess in our children's bedrooms.

As all parents know, it's amazing what you can find in your kids' closets. Stuck underneath the pile of dirty clothes, you might find a lost book, homework assignment or mom's favorite jewelry. Anything's possible.

Our children's dress-up clothes take up one entire trunk, and there's not a turkey outfit anywhere in sight. You won't find any pilgrim outfit, either.

You will find plenty of princess outfits. At their age, there's more satisfaction being a princess than a pilgrim.

Becca and Bailey don't mind cleaning up, just as long as they don't have to carry the load. They'd rather leave that to their parents.

I don't blame them. Cleaning up is hard work, which explains why we're all so hungry by the time the holiday rolls around.

We'd eat a horse, except that it would take up too much room on the dinner table, crowding out all the other goodies. Besides, Americans are traditionalists. We want our Thanksgiving to look like a Norman Rockwell painting, with the turkey taking center stage.

No matter how we slice it, there's no taking the turkey out of Thanksgiving.

Mark Bliss is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.