Volunteers ready to serve Thanksgiving dinner

"First of all, we have to be thankful for what we have, and so many people there have nothing," said Meehan, executive director of the homeless shelter on Airport-Pulling Road.

"Being the alcoholic I am, I wouldn't be breathing today if not for St. Matthew's House," Meehan said Wednesday as he helped volunteers prepare food for the onslaught of about 500 people after 2 p.m. today.

Meehan is feeling much better this year and will be back on the line among the volunteers. Whether helping those less fortunate by donating food or serving it, those who help at the two largest Thanksgiving feasts in Collier County and the one in Bonita Springs do so as a way of giving back, said organizers.

"We love doing it. We've been doing it for 21 years, so we must love it," said Kathryn Shannon, a co-organizer of the Guadalupe Center dinner in Immokalee.

With 3,000 people expected, guests at the Guadalupe Center dinner will fill Immokalee Airport Park from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

"We have a whole cross-section of the Immokalee community. We get families, single men, farmworkers, just about every type of person," Shannon said.

Dozens of people volunteer the day before Thanksgiving in addition to the holiday itself, said John Lawson, Guadalupe Center vice president.

"The reason we do it is, we want to make sure we properly thank the migrant workers who put food on our table every day," Lawson said.

In Bonita Springs, the Cafe of Life will hold its sixth annual Thanksgiving dinner at the Liberty Lighthouse Church of God on Childers Street and Felts Avenue.

The nonprofit soup kitchen will serve meals from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., said Evelyn MacGregor, the cafe's manager. In keeping with the holiday, the cafe will offer turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberries, green bean casserole and dressing -- "the whole traditional Thanksgiving meal," MacGregor said.

"A lot of the people who come here are in worse ways than we are. They're from out of the woods or from other countries and just got here. A lot of them don't have families. It's a way of showing all of what God has given us and we want to share that with them," MacGregor said.