THANKSGIVING – and do you know why?

We lived in a small but romantic apartment in Sausalito (California). In hindsight it was actually a tiny and crappy place with a leaking roof and all; but as newlyweds, we didn’t notice. I prepared our first Thanksgiving turkey. The candles were lit, the wine poured, the table set and soft music in the background. I felt I was the one carving the bird in that famous Norman Rockwell painting. The crowd of excited family members (that would be my wife and the cat), watched with great expectations. The first bites were promising and the gravy made it all slide down so smooth. It was a huge success - until we spooned stuffing out of the turkey. That’s when we found a fully cooked plastic bag with some unmentionable flesh-like body parts; hopefully from the bird. Now how the heck would I have known it was in there to start with? Nobody had told me; did you know they stick gross stuff in there? Can’t they just throw it out? Obviously the turkey doesn’t need it anymore.

The following year, same setting and I was yet again doing Rockwell. This time I had remembered to remove that stupid plastic bag and its icky contents before placing the stuffing inside the bird. But as we spooned out the stuffing, we found a second plastic bag in that year’s bird (a bloody two-for-one?) That was the last time I had anything to do with a turkey other than eating it; true story. (Okay, so I dated one - but that was a million years ago, so it doesn't count).

The first American Thanksgiving included 13 Pilgrims, 90 Native Americans and a huge load of food. As far as I remember this was around 1621. Thanksgiving was initially based on God and church; the Pilgrims giving thanks to God for guiding them to this new world. If I had been a Native American back then, I would have asked God to rethink that whole “guiding to the new world” bit; wouldn't you? Oh well, here we are.

A few years later Thanksgiving was deemed a “civil” tradition, not one based on God and church. 300 years later (what took him so long?) President Roosevelt signed into law that we should all stuff a turkey and then stuff our faces on the fourth Thursday every November – like forever, I think he said.

Thanksgiving is one of the six big holidays around here; the Fourth of July, Christmas and my birthday being the top three. It has the year’s busiest travel-days; so busy that it seems nobody is staying home (would that actually be possible? I mean, where would we all go?) I don’t know how many turkeys are cooked for Thanksgiving, but as we all know, Americans eat 17.4 pounds (that would be 7.9 kilos for fans of the metric system) of that brand of bird annually. Obviously most of that is eaten on the fourth day of November and during too many weeks after (read: massive left-overs). Approximately 78% of the work-force has the day off. Football games on Thanksgiving kicked off in the 1890s (by the way, TV coverage sucked back then). Do you know why the day after Thanksgiving is called Black Friday? I didn’t think so. As the biggest retail sales day of the year, it carries some retail businesses from being “in the red” (loss) to being “in the black”, where “black” stands for profit; therefore Black Friday. So now you know.

I like Thanksgiving though I’m not easily sucked into the romance and glitter and tradition and all that stuff(ing). But I do like the fact that we get together with good friends and their children. We have a delicious meal (but no plastic bags with unmentionable body-parts; another promising tradition down the toilet). But it’s the togetherness that is overwhelming on this day. We go round the table and each of us express our thanks, recognizing how fortunate we are. Three things, family, friendships and health, top the list. Not being a turkey on this day, is a close fourth.

But it’s the smaller everyday stuff, all those things we take for granted 24/7 that gets me the most, makes me feel utterly lucky. Okay “breathing” is way up there, as I’m thankful being alive (the alternative really sucks). But what about greeting the neighbor when walking the dog, the flowers in the garden and the smiles at the super-market, the abundance of choices we have, the sunsets and I could go on forever. We are fortunate and we should acknowledge that more often, be more thankful and less ignorant. We get upset, stressed and angry about small stuff, and it is all small stuff when we look at the bigger picture. So Thanksgiving is such a valuable reminder of what we have and how lucky we really are, all considered. The less we take things for granted, the more fortunate we will feel, no matter what situation we are in.

And that is what I see in Thanksgiving as well as I see it in those other 364 days of the year. If you don’t already do this, you should try it, as it's life as it really should be – seriously.

HAPPY TURKEY DAY…

QUESTION OF THE WEEK:

Can a dog be a copy cat?

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