Happy Thanksgiving

Wendy Hornsby

This year, as I sit down with my family, prepared to tuck into an opulent meal, I am reminded how fortunate we are, how very much we have to be thankful for.  384 years ago, depending on the most accepted account of when the first Thanksgiving took place, a ragtag group of immigrants, religious refugees from a far shore, sat down to share a meal with the local, American born, people who had helped them to survive the Starving Time, as their first year in the new land came to be known.  I know there are many versions of what that first feast signified, but for now I want to stick to the mainstream message we have chosen to accept as the meaning of Thanksgiving.  That is, the feast was a sharing of bounty between the natives and the newcomers.   The United States, as F.D.R. reminded us, and we should all remember, is a nation of immigrants.  Let us celebrate that legacy of diversity, and let us always welcome the pilgrims who come here hoping for a better life.

I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving.