Where did thanksgiving go? I thought that we collectively agreed as a culture to not start Christmas until after the esteemed Turkey Day? Thanksgiving is an important holiday- it is the celebration of the final harvest before the cold sets in, honoring the life giving land, the mineral rich black soil that is the mother to us all, respecting the beauty of vegetables, the satisfaction of fruit, the life of birds.
This subtle societal agreement to wait for the Christmas is so far being observed that we are putting up Christmas posters and store art the very day after Halloween. The very next day, just to rub it in like an immature revenge, the red and green are all abound, the lights twinkling from the ceiling, dead trees elaborately dressed in all the glory the living has to offer. The tree blinks, and glistens, and glitters, topped with a star plucked from the heaves above. Why are people so excited for Christmas? We prepared so full heartedly, so spiritually enthusiastically, so momentously monetarily, so overwhelmingly aesthetically, and the very next day after Christmas it is all taken down and cast aside like a teenage crush. After this big lead up to Christmas, we are so ready for it to be over. How about instead we wait longer to get into the spirit and try to keep that joy around for a little longer than a day. I don’t know if this nation of Christians are aware, but Christmas lasts for 12 whole days. That’s like 12 times longer than we actually celebrate it.
Let’s bring back the wind up to thanksgiving, let reinvent the glamour in this holiday of culinary and harvest appreciation, and let’s try to give Christmas a fair shake.
Love,
Marigold.