weird holidays

[billy rubin]

in america, we celebrate thanksgiving.

nobody knows why we do it, and if you look atthe history, its never made very much sense.

its a day when millions of americans travel and die on the highways in order to arrive at a family feast where where they have legendary political arguments with people we never see at any other time.

in my own prairie past, the meal transformed from women in the kitchen and men on the porch to women anywhere talking about cooking and babies, and men anywhere talking about automobiles and football. the kids had their own little cardtables to fuss at each other.

then th emen wander off and the women clean up.

somewhere theres a reason for this.

right now, im not attending anybody else's event. im old enough to do my own now. everybody else is dead. now im the receding wave, running backwards down from the strand into the surf, there to be absorbed into the zeitgeist..

i have my number three and number two son, my number two daughter and her husband, and a visitor from south afrcica, zulu i imagine, who has been abandoned by the local quaker school for a week or two. the wife is in the borderlands up north, with her mother who has had abdominal surgery and needs an offspring from a thousand miles to the south because the two kids  close enough to get there in an hour are too busy.

isnt that how the world works?

anyway, here in appalachia, its a multi cultural extravaganza, complete with my live in son not talking to me except in profanities,  because i am imperfect.

oh well.

i went through that too when i was 21 years old. eventually he will discover that ive learned a great deal, and it will be better.

but in the meantime, theres roast ham, aqua fresca, fried rice, oklahoma cornbread, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, chickasaw succotash, and whatever else. with mexico, america, south africa, and oklahoma, theres no telling what will show up on the table.

ill take what i can get. my kids are important to me, whether they like me right now or not.

[billy rubin]

so like, happy thanksgiving.

[Dark Lightning]

Yeah, Happy Thanksgiving! I'm happy because my son replaced a leaking pipe on the water heater. I'm not scaling ladders with these knees. We no sooner get to it and I notice that the hot water expansion tank is seeping. If I'd've seen it sooner, I would have got it when I got the replacement pipe. Now, we'll have to shut the water off again to change that out. I hope it doesn't start spraying soon. I'm not buying anything tomorrow; I'm only going to drive to get my blood pressure retested. It's down from blood-spraying from the eyes pressure, but the nurse has to check it anyway.

[Ecurb Noselrub]

Actually, I love Thanksgiving. My wife puts on a great feast, which she likes doing. She makes most of the food, but our kids bring some dishes, as well. The whole immediate family (us, kids & spouses, grandkids and significant other, if any) gets together and we have a generally peaceful time. We finish eating, watch a little football, talk, and then they leave. Lasts about 3-4 hours. Yes, my wife does most of the clean-up, but that is her choice. The kitchen is her domain. I help if she wants me to, otherwise I stay out of her way. Sort of traditional, I guess, but she does not seem to mind. The total crown numbers 11, but this year our youngest grandson is in Phoenix going to technical school. He will be home for Christmas, however, when we will gather again for a less involved meal.

So, I do not find Thanksgiving weird. However, I do find Halloween weird. Not, mind you, the Halloween night trick-or-treating. That is fun and cute. But now it has become a month-long deal where people put 15-feet-tall skeletons and monsters in their yards, and all kinds of other scary paraphernalia. I don't really understand that part of it. It's not really even a holiday, as there is no time off from work - just about 3 hours of little witches and goblins and unknown figures coming to your door wanting candy. But some people are spending thousands of buck buying scary props. I don't get it.

[zorkan]

In UK we have harvest festival of thanksgiving in September / October rather than November in US.
Celebrated in churches but not homes.
Even so, most food is sourced from abroad.
Few orchards remain because it's cheaper to import.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvest_Festival_(United_Kingdom)

I'd get rid of the crazy May day holiday which few people seem to like and replace it with one in October.