Thanksgiving, as a North American tradition, is a festival historically held to celebrate the bringing in of the year's harvest. Folks would gather friends, family and communities together to party down with their new-found riches. They got to see their hard work rewarded and reaped with the bringing in of the season's crops. Before our current economic system and before Black Friday, it was simply enough to memorialize and gather to enjoy the fact that people didn't have to worry about food for the Winter. Tukwinong
(represents a bountiful harvest)
Other than Canada, the United States is practically the only country which celebrates this historic holiday. Unfortunately, our Lady Mistress Capitalism has distorted our celebration of the harvest. She got into bed with Democracy about eighty years ago and it didn't take her long to kick Lady Liberty right into the floor so she could give us her solo act. Like a timeless, enduring peepshow, we plug our money in the bottomless slot to keep the curtain up and the wheels turning. We've switched gears as far as our perception of Thanksgiving over the past hundred years. With grocery chain titans turning out food to our communities, there's less room for a feeling of reward and work paying off. Sure we work for our money and the money brings home the bacon. However, whether you buy the Kroger turkey or the Save-A-Lot turkey (based on your tax bracket,) you didn't have to catch the bird and lop it's head off in the back yard. No gutting, feather plucking, picking and storing of crops, or any of the work which went behind the long awaited annual feast. Don't get me wrong, the feast is still there and I'm by no means belittling the hours of kitchen time folks put in to feed their families. I'm simply saying there is no harvest to memorialize. Ironically, Mexico does not celebrate Turkey Day though their people are predominantly the ones doing the harvesting for us.
Yellow Corn Maiden
(represents a bountiful corn harvest)
Every year, we do stop to smell the roses so to speak on Thanksgiving (and make corporations a large chunk of their annual profits in one busy week.) Today we "give thanks" to honor our national holiday. It's important that we do hang onto this facet of our cultural event. Don't confuse material thanks with the heart-felt kind though. All this "giving thanks" starts one day and twelve hours later every-town America is absolutely insane and literally killing one another over mass-produced material goods that are on sale. Experience true thankfulness today but I challenge you also to do so tomorrow as well. When you're standing outside the store waiting for the doors to open so you can make the mad dash to the deal of the century, remember they want you hysterical. They want you running people down and fighting with each other. They want a couple of people to get trampled to death- you won't hear about it until tomorrow and by next year, you'll have forgot. They want it to be dangerous so you'll get the thrill and get the rush. They knew how hard it was for you to stop just 24 hours before and forget about the rat race. They know you want to run that last slice of pecan pie off. They want you back because you didn't spend enough of their money in their stores while you were busy eating and thanking.
Pause again tomorrow and remember what's really important- life and love (and everyone's is richer than money and richer than the harvest itself.) Pause again tomorrow and the next day and the next day.
The best to your and yours these holidays,
B
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