Be thankful

Happy Thanksgiving. Lets hijack a phrase from another holiday, “‘Tis the season to be thankful.” Seriously though. No matter how bad it seems, you’ve got lots to be thankful for.

I’m thankful.

I don’t show it as often as I should, because superfi cial issues seem to pop up and overshadow the good stuff and make me put thankfulness on the back burner, but not this week, baby. Not on Thursday. It’s Thanksgiving and I’m going to be thankful.

Some of you might be thinking, or saying, or tweeting, or posting, or tiktoking, or texting all kinds of crap about how bad things have become and we couldn’t possibly dig deep enough to fi nd something to be thankful for this year — y’all thinking that are glass-half-empty kind of folks.

It’s true. I don’t know you, or what you’re about, but what I can say with certainty is that you are alive because you’re reading this. You are literate, because you’re reading this. You are tolerant, because you are reading this.

These are all things to be thankful for, but I get it — we’ve been through a tough time since last Thanksgiving… things seemed bleaker then. National media continues to spout rhetoric and toxic division, preferring to give hate and dissent a voice while silencing tolerance and common sense.

Three quarters of a million people have reportedly died from COVID-19 related complications in this country and according to the WHO, more than 45 million were sick with it and recovered.

Families who unexpectedly lost loved ones don’t need convincing that COVID-19 is a reality — neither do people who spent days in COVID-19 intensive care wards, fi ghting for their lives.

Local businesses struggle to stay open in the wake of the pandemic’s shutdown and now rampant infl ation and the employment crisis add to the pain.

I could go on, but you get the idea. It’s dark and bleak right?

Well, its been worse.

A long time ago, a band of refugees traveled thousands of miles seeking escape from persecution. They were ill prepared, had no idea where they were going and the journey took much longer than expected. Storms and treacherous coastline forced them far north of their intended destination.

They arrived too late to prepare for a winter that none of them really saw coming. It was November, 1620, the location was Cape Cod, and that year, winter came early. It was brutal. So bad that the majority of the group were forced to stay on board the crowded ship called the Mayfl ower.

That winter, they suffered exposure, frostbite, scurvy, disease and starvation. By the time spring fi nally arrived, they had buried nearly half of their party. As the New England shoreline thawed, the survivors moved ashore — more in an effort to survive than to try and carve out a colony. They were unexpectedly visited by a member of the local Abenaki tribe. He spoke English and gave them assistance.

A few days passed and another Native American named Squanto arrived at their small settlement and he taught them how to feed themselves off the land and negotiated a peace between the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag tribe that lasted more than 50 years.

The next year, through hard work and perseverance, the corn harvest was a success and the governor of the colony organized a feast and invited the colony’s Native American friends.

That fi rst Thanksgiving has become just a vague story we learned in elementary school, but we should all refl ect and consider what it was really about.

The early settlers who came to America suffered hardships that few Americans today could comprehend, let alone overcome.

Death, sickness, hunger… all at levels that few today have experienced, yet these people found a way to survive.

These early colonists placed their faith and trust in a people and a culture very different from their own.

The Native Americans showed a limitless capacity for compassion and caring for their fellow man. This built a friendship and trust that is probably one of the fi rst examples of what makes this country what it is… what it needs to be.

Fast forward to Thanksgiving today.

Think about it. Things could be worse.

Now you should be able to think of something to be thankful for.

Thanks for reading.

Be tolerant.

Eat leftovers like there’s no tomorrow.