Bittersweet Thanksgiving

Around our table at Thanksgiving, as it is around about hundred million other households across the country, we traditionally take a moment or two for everyone to say what they are thankful for. Alas, this year, the gravy was still piping hot when we finished, since it was only Patricia and me expressing our gratitude. In one way, the list was as familiar this year as the dinner fare. The family is healthy and we are secure. So are our children, each with their own families. We are grateful for the love and support we all give each other, and so on.

But in another way, the list had a profoundly unfamiliar feel to it. 2020 was a trying year in so many ways. The pandemic lurks outside our door and has infiltrated way too many homes. The disease, and the precautions our society has taken in order to cope with it, have caused widespread economic hardship for frightening numbers, leaving food insecurity and emotional trauma in its wake. Education is taking a substantial hit, with schools and teachers and parents all struggling with how to make virtual education work. And the isolation of so many who did not get to enjoy their families and loved ones must be overwhelming, with the bleak likelihood that this is only the beginning of the holiday season.

And that’s just the virus. We wrestle similarly with the important attention brought about by the stupendously tragic deaths of people of color at the hands of those sworn to protect them. We feel disheartened by the Gordian knot of uncompromising opinion tying the hands of progress in our government and the resulting divisiveness that has led to the unprecedented reaction to the presidential election.

That’s the 2020 we all have shared in one way or another. On top of that, I managed personally to do a face plant in the winter, breaking my nose and spraining my hand. Then in the summer I got very sick and found myself hospitalized for a week In the fall, I had surgery, and just about the time I felt well, I fractured my foot. But for all this, I feel lucky – lucky that it happened the year we were all sequestered. And lucky that my saintly, patient spouse willingly cared for me as I recovered four times in twelve months. Lucky that we have excellent health insurance. Lucky that I am of decent general health and recovered quickly.

Anyway, for our table of two, sharing with each other over our turkey dinner with all the trimmings, expressing how we feel blessed seemed starkly antithetical to the world spinning out of control around us, bringing tragedy and trauma to so many. My heart aches, even as I reflect on the many things for which I am grateful, a bittersweet Thanksgiving to say the least. Clearly, there is more for me to do.