Thanksgiving...

Jamies Lee Curtis

The Huffington Post

November 28, 2008

Like so many things, its original intent and its current interpretation are out of whack. Just like America. I went to hear Eugene Jarecki speak about his new book, The American Way of War: Guided Missiles, Misguided Men an a Republic in Peril and he explained the sea change that occurred in 1947 with the great expansion of the Executive branch of the government. It was supposed to be balancedwith each branch counterbalancing the other. The Executive branch's fiscal and fundamental obesity epidemic is just one example of the misinterpretations.

I used to think that chicken was a protein but now that they are penned and caged they have become a fat, increasing that content threefold from lack of exercise and movement... sound like anyone you know... any ideas you know? The original idea was thanking God for the bountiful feast at the end of the harvest... or according to my fourth grade textbook, Thanksgiving was supposed to have been when The Pilgrims were saved by the Native Americans, that they had raped and pillaged, and that after being taught to plant corn -- maize -- the Pilgrims were so thankful that they invited the Indians to a supper... Bullshit.

We now know the truth about the Pilgrims and the Native Americans and instead we have turned this into an excuse to gather as families and eat until we are sick. Nice... No Native Americans or Iraqis, Iranians, or, in most white people's cases, African Americans. And certainly no French people present at the feast of reconciliation and gratitude. No, Just Uncle Frank who hates the fact that his brother carves the non-Palin-pardoned turkey poorly ( I betcha it was the one that still quaked in the background as she prattled on ) and that Aunt Alice thinks it is always "too dry" which she slurs during her fifth glass of boxed wine.

Real thanks and giving is from truth. Hard, ugly, painful truth, about ourselves and our families and our nation. So on this Thanksgiving let's try to count our blessings and not our calories, blessings not balance sheets, blessings not division, blessings not bombs.

Thanks to Barack Obama for his courage, for our children that they will get a chance to see real change occur, as Bette and Mae said, "Fasten you seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy night ( few years )."

Blessings for our path-cutters... a favorite quote from one of those Greek Genius', "Civilization flourishes when great men plant trees under the shade of which they will never stand."

Blessings for the brave who first said "No, I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!" and put their lives and limbs on the line for us and the brave men, women and children who continue to fight for the right to fight for the right...

So this Thanksgiving let's fight for the right to disagree, to discourse, to dissemble the things that don't work and plant seeds of change whithin ourselves, our families, our communities, our Nation and our World, that they will bloom and grow and yield new truths that we will all hold... that are and should always be self-evident... That all men, women, children, of every race, creed, color, religion, sexual orientation, are created equal.

Equal for all.

Please God!

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