As the weather changes from chilly and wet to cold and windy (thanks Missouri), house after house begin to participate in a worrying trend: early Christmas and holiday decorations. The day after Halloween, most houses in Kirkwood immediately set up a blowup Santa in their yard and hang colored lights from the roof. When snow is falling and friends are calling this would all be splendid, but the holiday season is still far away. All the sparkling lights of winter caused us to lose sight of something important: Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving is known as a time for friends and family to gather together, be thankful and eat food, supposedly believed to resemble what the Wampanoag people shared with the Pilgrims of the Plymouth colony. Thanksgiving has been celebrated in America since 1621, but it became an official holiday in Dec. 1941.
Today, families gather around tables full of hearty foods like stuffing, mashed potatoes and a wide variety of pies. Kids make hand-print art projects in the shape of turkeys, and everyone takes time to express what they were thankful for. Recently, this tradition of gratitude has been overshadowed by the commercialization of Christmas, and the entire holiday season.
The rampant consumerism of our society, not just in Kirkwood suburbs, makes the Christmas season alluring to Americans. The swipe and “transaction completion” of our credit cards only add more weight to our capitalist society, and the profits of the companies that benefit from these sales skyrocket. Almost every dollar spent on the perfect gift for your friends from a fortune 500 company goes directly into the hands of already rich shareholders of those businesses, and out of ours. By no means am I trying to say that we should toss out the assorted gift-giving winter holidays; all I want to see is a breath of fresh air before we dive headfirst into gingerbread and eggnog.
Instead of the sad mix of leftover Halloween pumpkins and trimmed Christmas trees, we should be getting ready to celebrate one of the most selfless holidays out there. Instead of being centered around getting and giving, we should prepare for the celebration of sharing. And hey, it might teach us something.
