Today being Thanksgiving, I think it is important to remind ourselves why Americans should be thankful – and give thanks.
I like to remind myself and my readers how thankful Americans should be whenever I can. In Custom Maid Spin for New World Disorder I wrote:
Thanksgiving is a uniquely American holiday, thanks to the
Pilgrims who survived their first harsh winter in Massachusetts
and celebrated the first Thanksgiving in 1621. They set aside
time to give thanks for their bountiful harvest and to live in peace
with their Native-American neighbors in the Land of the Free. A
land where they could live and worship freely. In his Thanksgiving
Proclamation of 1789 George Washington urged Americans to give
thanks “for peaceable and rational manner in which we have been
able to establish constitutions of government for our safety and
happiness.”
….
Turkey has been a mainstay of Thanksgiving dinners from the very
beginning. But the modern bird, like Americans, is much different
than its earlier ancestors. Earlier turkeys were naturally smaller and
more wiry, and they had less breast meat than today’s birds, which
have been bred to satisfy Americans preferences for white meat.
Today’s male turkeys, like many leading American politicians, are so
top-heavy that many can’t fly or even walk without toppling over,
and most are incapable of mating. Was it not for artificial insemination,
the species would be extinct.
In Custom Maid Revolution for New World Disorder I wrote:
Thanksgiving is an immigrant’s holiday, and since all Americans
are either immigrants or descendants of immigrants, the concept
of everyone celebrating their cultural family traditions and eating
and being thankful as immigrants, is based on the legend that the
settlers of the Plymouth colony, in desperate gratitude to God for
their first good harvest, gave thanks to the Lord and the natives.
The previous winter, they had lost nearly half their number to
starvation, illness and attacks. A successful harvest, along with the
peaceful participation of the Wampanoag Indians in the feast, meant
that from that point on the Pilgrims might endure.
But history tells us that the Plymouth settlers, when sure of a good
harvest – and good defenses – repaid their native hosts with mistrust,
disease and war. It’s hard to survive, even harder to stop behaving like
a survivor. One of the great human virtues is gratitude.
We should be:
Thankful we can disagree with our political leaders, including the president, when we don’t agree with their policies, laws or politics.
Thankful anti-Semitism and Racism is being acknowledged.
Thankful sexual harassment and women’s rights in the work place is being addressed.
Thankful the Constitution is being studied again to determine how best to fulfill the Founding Fathers dream.
Thankful the Democratic and Republican parties have imploded and movements have taken root.
Thankful the swamp is being drained in more ways than anyone of us anticipated.
Thankful ….