Friendsgiving: A time to be thankful

Friendsgiving%3A+A+time+to+be+thankful

Abby Hendrickson, Bella Coulter, Staff Writer

By Abby Hendrickson and Bella Coulter

I sit at the dining room table, sipping on my sparkling grape juice and wait. I check the time. Late once again. I click on my phone to stare at the time and see a new message. My eyes quickly scan its content and my mouth drops open.

“Are you kidding me?!” I yell.

My wonderful friends (who I am very thankful for, don’t get me wrong) will be late once again; but not just normal late, like a couple of minutes, but an HOUR late.

In preparation for our feast I had not eaten anything all day, and I was starving. I had been counting down the minutes until 5 p.m. sharp when I finally got to gorge myself on the multi-cultural friendsgiving we had been planning for weeks. But alas, it was not to be, and I would have to subject myself to another hour of stomach pains and hunger-induced insanity.

I nibbled on a roll slathered in butter to satiate my stomach growls, but to no avail. And then, finally, finally, finally I saw the car headlights make their way across the window and I leapt to my feet.

It’s time. 

After the excitement (or lack thereof) of Halloween, comes the waves of autumnal spirit. As some of the population skips ahead to the joys of Christmas, others adamantly demand attention given to Thanksgiving. 

We, of course, want to give Thanksgiving the attention it deserves; however, we cannot forget its gruesome beginnings.

The history behind Thanksgiving has definitely been white-washed, as the kindergarten lesson of Native Americans and Pilgrims in buckled hats holding hands and singing Kumbaya is not accurate. The colonists (go figure) altered history to be a bit more flattering towards themselves. Squanto may have taught them how to farm (preventing mass famine), but let us not forget the mass genocide that ensued of an ENTIRE race of people that previously existed. Just a friendly reminder to remember that the victors will write history on certain events, and there will be a level of bias as a consequence. 

Anyway, while the origin may not be pure, Thanksgiving is now a holiday in American society to reflect on the privileges of our lives and be grateful for them. I guess now it’s not so bad.

Our friend group decided that this year we would have a “friendsgiving,” where everyone brings a dish or two and has a nice dinner to fully appreciate how blessed we are to have each other in our lives. 

Despite our desire for a nice Thanksgiving dinner, it was not traditional by any means.

We are blessed in that we have a variety of cultures represented in our friend group, that provide a plethora of perspectives and delicious dishes that we can all share. Of course, we took full advantage of this at our dinner.

Thus, we enjoyed homemade lumpia and pancit (Philippines), dumplings and fried rice (China), mashed potatoes and brussel sprouts (United States), and apple pie and pumpkin bread (dessert … as it is its own culture). 

Despite its rocky start, the dinner turned into one of joy and festivities, and we had a wonderful time chuckling over hilarious anecdotes and delicious food. We were able to truly appreciate how lucky we are to have such amazing and beautiful friends with whom we can share these life experiences. 

To all of the wonderful people in our lives: We love you and keep sparkling just like seven bottles of delicious juice we drank <33