Klarinet Archive - Posting 000001.txt from 2004/12
From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Anna_Cecil=EDa_Benass=ED?=" <acb@-----.is>
Subj: [kl] Happy Thanksgiving - musings from an expatriated American
Date: Wed, 1 Dec 2004 04:39:20 -0500
Well, I thought I'd be beating a dead horse by writing on this now, but my
last digest was full of Th'giving posts, so I guess I'll give it a shot.
I never grew up thinking of Th'giving as a US tradition per se, though of
course our celebration was a mirror of many other Th'giving celebrations
all over the country. It has always been my favorite holiday, and I have
often ruminated on why this is so.
Well, the food is great - and even if you let others eat the turkey and
pounce instead on the pumpkin pie, apple pie, cranberry sauce, sage
dressing, mashed potatoes, etc. etc. ad infinitum, it's still a damn good
meal.
And though Americans (United Statesians?) have been more intensely focused
on their national identity in the past 3 years than they were before
nine-eleven, we - in my family, at any rate - always felt a spirit of
thanks for "having it good". In my youth this transcended being American;
it was more a sense of being grateful for having enough for our needs and
most of our wants. Whom did we thank? I think that was a private matter
that each person worked out inside his own soul.
But on a more immediate level, it was a chance for family to get together
and spend all or a portion of that 4-day weekend in a relaxed manner. We
often managed to get together with relatives whom we saw rather seldom, so
that increased the excitement. But there was none of the hype and tension
that often accompanies Christmas (at least in my memory as a nominal
Catholic). No gifts, no frantic shopping for this and that, no guilt over
the time that went into the material aspects of Xmas when, as Caroline
Ingalls said once in a "Little House" episode, "it's Christ's birthday,
not ours". Add to this the fact that the weather at that time of year was
usually splendid - that invigorating crisp fall air that, if you're far
enough south, can be accompanied by spectacular multi-colored foliage.
But on a more humorous note, I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the
inalienable right of American men to sit on their collective arses for the
bulk of Thanksgiving weekend staring at college football Bowl games on the
idiot box. This, too, has long been an inextricable part of my
Thanksgiving memories.
It was a bipartite system: the men - or most of them - gathered around and
worshipped their electronic god, usually while consuming beer, and always
dressed in nice clothes; while the women - or most of them - were in the
kitchen, getting the g-ddam turkey into the oven at the right time and
basting it at proper intervals, creaming the onions, making the mashed
potates, finishing up any pies that didn't get baked the day before, and
doing strange things to giblets in order to create gravy. The cleanup was,
thanks be to higher powers, a more egalitarian affair. But I have to say I
never felt shortchanged. I like cooking better than football anyhow, and
while they were slamming beers, we women could sip cooking sherry - or
scotch - if the fit took us. There was no shortage of good cheer, no
matter what the beverage.
For the last 18 years I've lived in Iceland, where there is no
Thanksgiving and the 4th Thursday in November is just another workday.
This year I taught til 8pm and then came home and ate (delicious) fish for
dinner on Thanksgiving day. Forgot it was even Thanksgiving, for that
matter. But I do miss it, perhaps more than anything else from the "old
country." If I can ever arrange my work schedule to free up that day, I'll
celebrate Thanksgiving much the same was as we did when I was Stateside.
But without the football. Don't think you can watch it up here, and I
don't own a TV anyway.
And as several people have already said, it's never inappropriate to think
carefully about the good in one's life. Whether one eats turkey or dal and
pulao is immaterial.
Warmest regards to all during this holiday season.
Anna
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Anna BenassÃ
State-Certified Translator
English <–> Icelandic
Lindarbraut 2a
170 Seltjarnarnesi
ICELAND
tel: +354 562-6636
mobile: +354 895-1958
e-mail: acb@-----.is
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