Teen to Teen Talk
Thanks Giving
By Elizabeth Horner

Two separate images pop into my head when I think of Thanksgiving. There is what actually happens--- three people around a table meant for eight, turkey and slightly over mashed potatoes (my fault), and then, as the evening drags on, a draw towards other things. And then there is this idea I have of Thanksgiving, not as a series of tasks, but as a warm, kind of orange glow--- the kind that surrounds happy families in TV commercials right before it fades to black.

Reconciling the two isn’t always easy--- not from any lack of trying on my family’s part. I just think that that glow is a sign of perfect contentment, of gratitude, and even a bit of complacency that cannot always be brought out at the holidays like the fancy plate-ware. Please, give me a chance to explain.

I have been called a perfectionist on several occasions. It has not been meant as a good thing. It is that compulsion which has inspired me to correct my friends’ grammar, to re-write diary entries, to worry about something I’m sure I left in my bedroom at home, but what if I’m wrong? Trust me, I get just annoyed about it as everyone else. Sometimes it seems as if I accomplish one thing only to start fretting about another, and I admire others their zen attitude.

But, of course, I understand that this quirk of mine is what inspires my progress as a person. I was unhappy with my weight, and that insecurity ate at me until I stopped eating for it. Towards the end of high school, my work load had started to overwhelm me, and it made me doubt my ability to rise to its challenges; therefore, freshman year of college, I strove to get ahead on assignments, pay attention more, so that I never felt that desperate again. I knew that I had a habit for closeting myself into my room; that I didn’t like taking the risks of meeting new people or trying new things. So I vowed to myself to be more like the characters in the books I so loved, and do things that scared me. Those risks have paid themselves off in so many ways.

And yet, I do not count myself as being entirely satisfied. I fully acknowledge that I am still living in the bubble of an educational institution and that outside of it, there is the uncertainty of finding a job, growing up, and building a life. I have always been used to being the one to know all sorts of random facts, and now I’m meeting people my own age whose breadth of knowledge is so much wider than mine--- I strive to match it. I want to learn to cook better, to write better, to develop enough arm strength that I don’t need to ask my boyfriend for help to open a jar (cliché, I know, which makes me dislike the practice even more). I want, I want, I want…

I’m sure all of this is still not sounding very Thanksgiving-y.

Except, all those centuries ago, when the Pilgrims sat down to eat the first good harvest that they had known, I’m sure that things weren’t perfect for them either. The New World had been hard to them; afflicting them with cold winters, harsh conditions, and diseases they were not familiar with. Thanksgiving represented, not a triumph over each and every thing that plagued them; just the first.

And even now, with the advent of all our technologies, new medicines, the benefits provided by our melting pot culture, we are still reaching--- hoping for improvement. I am thankful for it.

I am thankful for having so many things left to do with my life, for manageable problems that I can overcome and an attitude that will not let me despair in the face of them. I am thankful for my parents, who are not perfect, who did not have perfect lives, but have sacrificed everything for the chance that mine will be better, that I will get to do more. I am thankful for the rules of gravity, for keeping us grounded, and the Wright brothers for not accepting that as the final answer. I am grateful for the darkness inside the tunnel, which made Thomas Edison think of inventing the light-bulb in the hope… in the hope… that it would get us through to the light on the other side.

If I think about it, I might have two different ideas of Thanksgiving. I’m stuck with the first one, and the truth is, I find it infinitely superior. For while the second might glow with the aura of all wished-for things granted, it is like the last page of a book, blank except for the words “the end”. Oftentimes, what I regret most in the moment when that back cover snaps closed--- leaving Harry and his family on Platform 9 3⁄/4, waving goodbye to Frodo as he sails for another world, sending off Ender into space--- it’s that I wasn’t appreciative of what I was being given as the story was happening or of the struggles that they faced, to make such an ending possible. (Screen fades to black).