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Thanksgiving made simple

Today is Thanksgiving, perhaps the most universally observed of distinctly American holidays. This post is for my many foreign readers, who may find it difficult to understand what the Americans are doing on the fourth Thursday of November and why it is considered so important. I generally refuse all invitations to be anywhere but with family for the entire week.

Thanksgiving marks one of America’s founding myths:  that early settlers celebrated their first year in the New World together with friendly Native Americans in what is now Plymouth, Massachusetts. These weren’t the first settlers in what is now the United States:  in 1607 settlers had arrived at Jamestown, Virginia and the Spanish had founded St. Augustine, Florida in 1565. But somehow the Pilgrims who arrived on the Mayflower have taken precedence in the popular imagination.

Few Americans will skip the holiday altogether and most try to celebrate it with extended family. Recent immigrants as well as those descended from the original settlers join the festivities, which are remarkably standard and simple: a giant meal for 10-20 family and friends. The main dish is most often stuffed turkey (that’s why President Obama yesterday “pardoned” two turkeys) but can also be duck, goose or even something that never vaunted feathers. Frequent side dishes include sweet potatoes, green beans, macaroni and cheese, salad, and soup for a first course. Desserts include pumpkin pie, pecan pie, apple crisp and lots of other good things.

The precise menu is not as important as the abundance and the presence of family members. A Thanksgiving dinner is intended to be your one big meal of the day, lasting for several hours and guaranteed to fill you to the brim. The presence of family members, who have often traveled from afar, is also important to the occasion. This sometimes leads to awkward family conversations or disputes, but less often than Hollywood’s use of the device would suggest.

Friends and acquaintances are also included at Thanksgiving dinner. If you have an invitation, I hope you accepted it, as your hosts will no doubt be happy to have you join the festivities. Americans feel good about Thanksgiving and like it when others participate.

The meal may start with saying grace, even in non-religious families. While this can be brief, it betokens the deeper meaning of the holiday, which is gratitude for whatever good fortune may be our lot. Even those who have good reason for complaint will join in expressing their thanks for whatever blessings come their way and their hopes for a better future.

But Thanksgiving wouldn’t be the joyous holiday it is if it were all that serious. Children devote the morning to watching the Thanksgiving Day Macy’s parade, which features giant balloons and floats of all your favorite cartoon characters marched through the often bitter cold canyons of New York City. The afternoon is more often than not devoted to watching football (American, not soccer). By late afternoon, some stores will be start their “Black Friday” sales, which attract mobs of people to begin buying their Christmas presents.

For some of us, the sad story of Michael Brown, killed by a policeman in Ferguson, Missouri, will cast a pall on the Thanksgiving proceedings. We may spare a moment of prayer for the end of such incidents, which raise serious doubt on whether America has come to terms with its own racial and ethnic diversity.

But it wouldn’t be right to end this “Thanksgiving made simple” post with a down beat. So here is niece Liz Days playing the reverend’s wife Tammy Lawn, a character in the web series Plant:

PS:  Here is Liz’s “all of the above” post-Thanksgiving sandwich, which weighs in she says at 938 calories: