Gingerbread

 

This morning, my sister had a smack-the-head moment over Wordle…here she was just refrigerating some gingerbread dough, and it never occurred to her to try the word.  (Since this doesn’t go out until tomorrow morning, I’m not giving anything away.)

It occurred to me that I should mix a batch myself.  It would be nice to have that ginger-molasses aroma in the house, especially with Thanksgiving only four days away.  So I did. 

This Thanksgiving, though, for me (and, I suspect from a lot of talk around, for others as well) isn’t quite the lighthearted food-laden family and friends round the table. A bountiful table takes on a darker shade these days.  Rising prices, decreased means, too many uneasy people already in need, some on the brink of expulsion from houses, work, school…

For those of us who believe we have enough, there is a loud smack of reality causing concern about our communities at large...which includes ourselves.  Listening to loud black helicopters circling ostentatiously low over our town one morning last week  not only stirred anger among us, but reminded us sharply of other times in our history when such actions, meant to create fear and divisiveness, led only to a state weakened by distrust.

Thankfully, in my neighborhood and in many others, this unsettling time seems to have driven people to act:  week after week, grocery bag after bag…many more than usual…have appeared on my porch. I bring them to food pantries all over town. There are at least a dozen community markets and kitchens all trying to keep people fed and safe, all trying to reverse the tunnel-vision currently in charge.

The neighbors who stop by are concerned, want to do something; sharing food is where they start. They are also as angry as I at the lack of humanity exhibited daily in the way things are run. Are governments so distanced from the rest of us that they put us all at risk with their clueless directives? I hear again and again.

So this Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday of the year, gingerbread on the table along with everyone’s shared offerings,  it won’t feel as much like a celebration, underpinned as it is with worry about what others don’t have, about what’s to come because of that.

I also suspect that, just about now, some of you will take a nervous step back from my bluntness.  Shouldn’t we, you would say, find some way to bypass what’s staring us in the face and find something cheerful to make holidays happy?

I believe in optimism…I do.  Too often I hear those words that come with a shrug of resignation:  But what can I do?  

But without the dismissive shrug, those same words can be empowering.

Optimistically put, what can I do? means going out to find what I can do. Collecting food for those without is a start, yes, but there is so much more.  Putting on caps of decency and humanity, asking questions, listening to answers, and actively pursuing a way to make change for others’ safety and our own, we find plenty to do. It takes first of all understanding.  Deliberate ignorance isn’t a go.

This year, I wish you all a grateful and knowing Thanksgiving,

reaching out to others any way you can.