Thursday, November 14, 2013

Give Thanks for Thanksgiving



My 20 year old son posted a cartoon on Facebook this week. (Yes I am his friend, yes I made him friend me when he was in high school and yes I do realize that after he sees this he will unfriend me.)

The cartoon is by Randy Bish of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. In it a hysterical Thanksgiving turkey is yelling at Santa, “DECEMBER, Fat Boy! This month is for MY holiday! Now hop in that sleigh and WAIT your TURN!”

I couldn’t agree more.

I love Thanksgiving. There is nothing like gorging on tryptopham turkey and 500 calories -per-slice pecan pie with abandon. It is a time we can just slow our roll, hopefully take a day off and be grateful. 

Seems like a simple thing. Can’t we just do that for one full day before we catapult into the Christmas chaos? Every year my sons and I boycott whatever company broadcasts the first holiday commercial we see. So far the offenders have been DeBeers diamonds, Lexus and Carnival cruise line, no conflict yet. 

I know things are tough and sometimes we can lose sight of what we have. If you need a nudge, here are a few things.

Be thankful for the food you have. The number of people that the North Texas Food Bank serves every month would fill Cowboys Stadium 2.5 times. Think about that while you are sitting in your home theater booing the Raiders.

Give thanks for family, however crazy, and try to be with them. Traditions matter. Every year I have to hear the story about how I cooked a ham with the plastic wrapper still on it but who cares? 

If you have a job, good. If you get off for Thanksgiving, even better. This year “In response to interest from customers who prefer to start their shopping early” Macy’s joins Target, Kohls and Target by opening on 8pm Thanksgiving evening. Really? If you do go shopping be thankful for the workers who make that possible. Tell them. Plenty won’t. 

Woudn’t it be great if we give thanks 364 days of the year and spent one day at the mall? With online shopping it is possible and I think we would have our priorities straight.

1 comment:

Tony McGurk said...

It really annoys me that stores pushing their xmas wares seem to start earlier & earlier every year.