Did you know that football has been part of Thanksgiving since 1876?! It was a day that everyone had off, so they could go to the game.
For all of our international readers, this Thursday is Thanksgiving in the U.S. It’s a celebration of the harvest, and a time to count our blessings and thank everyone who contributed to all the good things in our lives. It’s celebrated with a roasted turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, cranberry sauce, corn on the cob – because that’s what the pilgrims ate at the first Thanksgiving – with different additions depending on what part of the country you live in. It’s accompanied by parades, football games (the Detroit Lions and the Dallas Cowboys ALWAYS play on Thanksgiving Day), and for the past few years, crazy Holiday shopping hours with BIG SALES.
In everyone’s life there are years when giving thanks is harder than others. Loss. of friends and family members, jobs, homes, comes to us all. Sometimes it can be all to easy to think (paraphrasing Buddha) “Life’s a bitch and then you die.” But then, there’s that patter of rain on the roof after a too-long dry spell like the sound of gold falling from the sky. There are the cattle, sheep or goats in the pasture, heads down and growing fat on that grass you worked so hard to grow. There’s the friend who helps you put the barn back up after a wind storm, the people who reach out to show their fellow vets how the land can heal, and the solutions that come from everyone working together for the common good. At its most basic, saying thanks for those things, the every day things, is what Thanksgiving is all about.
One of the every day things that we’re grateful for is YOU. True, we may never have met, but Rachel and I think of you every morning when we get up, grab our cups of coffee/tea and head to our offices – one in Arizona, one in New York. We imagine you out with your livestock, checking your pastures, sitting at the table with your family and then think, “What does this person need to make their lives better? What information can we find, and how can we translate it into something they can use?” We like sitting at our computers, with you in mind, and we love it when you send in a comment to an article, or when you drop us a note asking us to find something for you.
This Thursday, we will imagine you at your table, where ever in the world you might be, and we’ll hope that you’re surrounded by loved ones, and that the joys of your everyday life are keeping you warm.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
Kathy and Rachel
