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Let's Really Give Thanks

It’s almost that time of year again. When the scene of moms cooking in the kitchen is reminiscent of that part in the movie when the character moves at the speed of light with sugar, spices, chicken, and turkey flying all over the place. Auntie's infamous macaroni and cheese, moms delightful dressing, my towering three layer German chocolate cake, and my male family members yelling at the cute, but losing football players through the TV screen--stereotypical, this I know but these are the visions that come to mind when I think about Thanksgiving.

A day dedicated to giving thanks for the year's blessings and challenges because they both contribute to one's growth, but are we really giving thanks? Supposedly commemorating the arrival of Pilgrims to Plymouth Rock with a Native American feat, this "holiday" marked the ending of a generation of Native Americans. Plagued by sickness brought on from contact with the new "settlers" and eventually enslaved or killed, Thanksgiving as it would later be called is actually an annual reminder of the slaughter of America's original settlers.

The worse part about it is that we carry on the tradition of slaughtering today. Of course, it’s not as graphic as mass genocide, but we use holidays as a way to break one another down. We dread the arrival of certain family members--that one aunt who insists on cooking for Thanksgiving even though every other day she relies on Healthy Choice or Top Ramen for her nourishment, and her subsequent children who believe that your room is just a smaller version of Disneyland or Chuck E Cheese's as they begin to jump on your bed, throw your toys about, and empty your drawer contents onto the floor.

Instead of praising one another's thankfulness, or genuinely inquiring about cousin Eric's promotion and Aunt Lena's surgery, we slip into the comments that question why it took Eric eight years to get the promotion, and why Aunt Lena didn't tell the family she was having surgery until after the procedure was finished. We have moved so far away from the moral and true definition of Thanksgiving, which literally means to give thanks that we are might as well rename the holiday to Slaughter Day. It symbolically represents the obscene amounts of money we spend on food, the millions of turkey that will be killed, and the pain we cause our families.

So while you are spending your salary on Honey baked ham, and sending Marie Calendar's stock through the roof, remember to be thankful for the ability to be surrounded by eccentric family members and their questionable side dishes because I guarantee there is someone in the world wishing they had a fruit cake to eat and a cousin Eric to talk too.