Today is the day many of us gather with family or friends to share meals, make memories and begin the holiday season. It is the time when millions take to the roads to travel home. Frenzied plans, football games, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, the latest games or toys all compete for our attention or our money. It’s easy to lose sight of what the season really should be about.

The idyllic portrait of the hearty Pilgrims sharing a bountiful feast with the Wampanoag Native Americans after a particularly harsh winter in 1637 began the tradition that we still observe today. The details of the first Thanksgiving  have been passed from generation to generation, despite historians who tell us the reality was probably very different from the story.

Yet the concepts of Thanksgiving are very simple and also essential: freedom, survival, celebration and community. Those four things are still just as resonant in today’s chaotic world as they were hundreds of years ago at Plymouth Colony.

We all should be thankful for the freedom to choose our own paths; to worship or not, as our consciences guide us; the freedom to achieve and change. We have the freedom to define our own ways of giving thanks.

Americans are also survivors. We are resilient even in the midst of hardships. We come together in times of crisis and we value community. This has been proven time after time. Wars, natural disasters, financial collapses — we rebound and then regroup.   

So as you sit at grandma’s house or your own table, try to remember the long year that has passed and celebrate the good things. Savor the special people, the successes and the blessings we all sometimes take for granted, especially at this busy time of year.

Enjoy the day. Happy Thanksgiving. — Pula Davis, The Gazette, for the editorial board.

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