Thanksgiving Musings

It doesn't seem much like Thanksgiving around here. There are no Hallmark cards, no turkey decorations, no supermarket endcaps filled with Stove-Top, and certainly no overzealous department stores with Christmas decorations up. The weather isn't even right, 98 degrees just isn't holiday weather.

I remember being in the 1st grade Thanksgiving Pageant at school. I was a pilgrim woman and my line, along with the rest of the pilgrim women, was "Mercy Me, Mercy Me!" (This, when I think about it, makes me wonder what kind of education I was receiving, as, if I remember correctly, the men had an equally sexist line espousing their bravery as a foil to the womens' lack there of. But I digress...) I also remember that I was quite upset I wasn't an Indian woman. Indian women had much cooler costumes. This was also the year I learned the story of Thanksgiving. Oh, yes, I know I heard the G rated story that left out the many atrocities and near genocide of Native Americans. Instead, I heard about the Mayflower, and the kind Indian named Squanto who helped the Puritans survive in their new home and taught them to make popcorn. Since 1st grade, I've rarely thought about the origins of Thanksgiving. It's more or less been a holiday to eat a lot with people you are related to (which for the Bailey's is a common event that doesn't even require an official holiday!)

I was thinking earlier today, as I dined on some delicious Thanksgiving fare at the Ambassador to Mali's house, about that first Thanksgiving. I didn't think about the Indians, the atrocities, or even the food though. I thought about the Pilgrims. I thought about what it would have been like to be far from home, to be in a foreign landscape, listening to an Indian tongue, trying to eek out a living in a world which is hostile simply because it is unfamiliar. Perhaps, for the first time in my life, I'm beginning to realize why holidays were invented at all.

As a stranger in a strange land I completely understand the need to to celebrate. Tonight as I sat in the home of the American Ambassador (our gracious host for the evening's festivities) I felt a kinship with a group of people who left home in search of a different life. They left to gain freedom, and in our most idealist of moments we PCV's leave home to give (and gain in our own transient way) freedom. Even on the best days in a foreign country you can't help but think about the home you left, the people you miss, the food you ate, and the security afforded by being surrounded by the familiar. Maybe we create these celebrations as a way of recreating the familiarity that we left behind. For just a moment we can join together as a "family" and momentarily shrug off our lonliness in favor of unity. So even with the warm weather and sorry lack of parades, Thanksgiving somehow manages to make me feel at home.

Enjoy Black Friday!

Gypsy on!