I’m such a crotchety old lady. I think Thanksgiving is kind of a fraud. I mean, we’re essentially celebrating pilgrims taking over the land from the native americans, except for this one day they supposedly got together to eat this big meal and play nice.

 

I’m not buying it.

 

It’s just a transition between halloween and christmas and a way for us to justify eating mass quantities of food.

 

I’m also not into the whole “let’s all give thanks” thing. Why don’t you do that all year? You need a holiday where you gorge yourself to remind you to be thankful of the things in your life? What about the rest of the year?

 

Plus, as a vegan, it’s really quite a painful holiday for me. If I want the thanksgiving dinner experience, I have to make everything myself. From scratch. I always feel like I’m putting everyone out if I’m invited somewhere.

 

Don’t get me wrong. I love green bean casserole and stuffing and mashed potatoes…but they don’t make vegan cream of mushroom soup. So I gotta make that too.

 

Furthermore, there are bittersweet memories attached to thanksgiving for me. 4 years ago, it was the last good day our kitten Jager had before he got really sick. I remember that we thought maybe he was making a comeback, he gobbled up the turkey we gave him and almost seemed OK. As humans, we innately search for connections and want to believe things are connected when they’re really just coincidences, so I don’t believe there was some “thanksgiving magic” that made him vaguely healthy that particular day…but I’ll always remember it. I AM thankful that we had one last really good day with him. But he was just a baby, and I will never forget how much it hurt when he didn’t get better and we had to…you know.

Now that I’ve done my venting, I’ll take this time to, like everyone else today, tell you what I AM thankful for. But I try to be thankful for these things every day. I don’t always succeed at that, because I am a crotchety old lady, but I remember most of the time. So without further adieu, here are the things I am immensely grateful for, in no particular order:

• The boyfriend
• The mom
• The dad
• The stepmom
• Taco
• Moosh Moosh
• LOLcats
• WholeFoods’ vegan cupcakes
• Chocolate in general
• My employment, even if it’s at one job I love and one that I hate
• My brains (I guess my DNA?)
• My self-esteem
• My friends
• Football
• Beer
• My success at not smoking on weekdays for over a month
• And a bunch of other stuff.

 

Happy Catsgiving!