Thanksgiving, at its foundation, is a weird holiday. Frankly, it is my favorite of the whole year. It is a huge paradox of a celebration, drawing its roots from early seventeenth century history that, at best, can be labeled as dark. But still it gave us a bright holiday dedicated to demonstrating our thankfulness and taking stock of our blessings.
Let’s be fair about the origins of Thanksgiving. No Native American is likely to look upon this holiday as a moment of ethnic celebration. The historical truth is that when the Pilgrims aboard the Mayflower first landed on the Eastern coastline of America, they came ashore at a small place near present-day Truro on the shore of Cape Cod, called Corn Hill. Here, the sick and half-starved Pilgrims staggered up the dunes. They came upon an empty Native American village. It was surrounded by a series of mounds. Some of these were full of reserves of corn (hence the name) that the indigenous villagers had set aside as their winter stores. Other mounds were burial sites. And what was the first act of our Pilgrim forefathers? They pulled out their shovels and set to digging up the corn and desecrating and looting the gravesites.
Not a bad opening act: steal someone else’s emergency food supplies and despoil the scared ground of their ancestors. The Pilgrims made their way along the coastline, looting and stealing from Native American villages and their inhabitants as they went. It was becoming a new way of life. Naturally, the abused and insulted Native Americans gradually became more hostile. Eventually, the Pilgrims moved along the coast from Cape Cod and made it to Plymouth where they made their immortalized landfall near the famous rock. It seemed like a good spot because the Nausets, the local tribe in the region, now thoroughly enraged by the Pilgrims and their thievery, seemed to be singularly absent from this area of coastline.
The settlement at Plymouth did not fare well. Half of the Pilgrims who had survived the sixty-six day voyage across the ocean perished from starvation, scurvy, tuberculosis, and infection. The rest only survived because the Native Americans took pity on these hapless survivors and brought sorely needed meats, vegetables, and fruits to them. Without their help, probably all of the Plymouth colony would have perished before spring.
We celebrate this singular, compassionate gift of food as Thanksgiving. But we must also remember that, implicit in this festivity, is not only gratitude but also the shame of our treatment of the indigenous peoples of America. Early on, under George Washington, a day was set aside for giving thanks. In 1863, at the height of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln set aside the last Thursday in November for the observation of Thanksgiving. In 1939, Franklin Roosevelt changed the designated day to the fourth Thursday in the November. Two years later Congress voted to make it an official national holiday. All this history gets packaged in myth and topped off with a stuffed turkey. In 1934, NFL football games were officially added to the tradition. Now, the day after Thanksgiving also triggers the most frenetic buying spree of the year—or so stock market and retail analysts hope. So it is an odd circuitous route that has led us to this holiday called Thanksgiving.
However odd and twisted its roots may be, Thanksgiving has now become a day devoted to thanks and prayer. To thoughts of caring for others less fortunate than ourselves. To taking stock of just how lucky we are to live in this country. To be aware of the most important gifts we have: our loved ones and our health. This year, there are a many who are not in good shape. Some have lost their homes and their jobs. Their businesses have failed. Their factories have closed. Natural calamities such as floods, hurricanes, and wild fires have obliterated their homes. We pray for them. We pray that their families and their fellow citizens can help them through the bitter winter ahead. We hope that assistance will arrive to help sustain their “colonies” just like the gifts from the Native Americans did for the forefathers. We think of the families who yearn for the safe return of a loved one overseas in our military. We know there is only one gift they seek and we beseech God they will receive it. We pray for ourselves because the more fortunate amongst us should not forget to display gratitude and humility.
Thanksgiving is also a pleasurable celebration because no one has to go out looking for a gift for anyone (other than bringing a pumpkin pie or preparing a plate of smashed sweet potatoes with little crisp marshmallows on top–neither of which the Native Americans brought to the first Pilgrim first-aid feast). It’s expected that families will draw together and let bygones be bygones and past transgressions be forgiven. After three helpings of turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy, and all the fixings, it’s time to pull up the lounge chair, let our belts out a notch, and catch a game. And remember the warped beginnings of the Pilgrims have led us to a holiday dedicated to the spirit of thanks. Not a bad ending—except, perhaps, for a lot of turkeys, who must refer to this day as Black Thursday. It certainly expresses the human potential to transform a bad beginning into a beautiful ending.

Read more about the historical accounts of the first Thanksgiving:

The History Channel - “The History of Thanksgiving”

The Christian Science Monitor - “The First Thanksgiving”

Other Thoughts on Giving Thanks:

USA Today - Your Health: Giving thanks can make you healthier, happier By Kim Painter, USA TODAY

…….and for when you are out shopping on Black Friday, remember these tips, Finding Joy in Gridlock Traffic by Karen Krakower found in Health Leader


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The loss of someone we love is a terrible blow. A spouse. A family member. A friend. Our bodies become just as wounded, crippled, and depleted as our hearts. There is a telling decline in health and even a significant rise in mortality after such a loss.

When we encounter someone who has just lost a pet dog or cat (or other significant animal), remember they may have lost a beloved member of the family, a close and dear friend. That pet may have been the only family they had. And that person is experiencing genuine pain and grief. We need to summon that same empathy and respect for their grief that we would whenever a loved one has passed away. We can’t just brush it off and say: “Oh, it was just an animal.” No, a beloved pet is far more that just an animal.

A friend of mine once said: “Dogs are God’s unconditional love wrapped up in fur.” That struck a chord with me. Pets don’t care if you’re rich or poor, Christian or agnostic, beautiful or ugly. They simply care that you are there. And when you are, their joy, their contentment to see you, to greet you is boundless. Imagine being able to emulate that sheer contentment at being reunited. One woman, in the midst of a contentious divorce, confided in her lawyer: “I wish my husband could love me the way my dog does.”

Sometimes, I see a dog on the street cuddled up next to a homeless person and think to myself: Good. At least that person has a canine angel to accompany him or her through the lonely, dangerous, and saddening journey of living on the street. The dog never thinks of abandoning that owner, no matter how bitter the life it must lead. Wherever that person goes, a loving soul will always accompany them. Like God’s unconditional love.

So here’s my plea: Next time you hear of someone whose dog has been badly injured or ill, treat it just as you would if a close human relative were in danger. Be supportive. Ask what you can do to help. Losing a pet may be one of life’s difficult experiences. Often it is a child’s first encounter with the finality of death. Sometimes that pet may have been a disabled person’s closest aide. Sometimes it’s an elderly shut-in’s last companion and friend.

There have been plenty of human beings I have encountered in my life whom I did not like, but not a single animal. People who lose a pet feel a gaping hole in their life. Help to mend it by respecting how profoundly they loved that animal. Acknowledge and support their grief as you would if you heard about any other significant emotional loss.
P.S. Rosie and Shadow, I miss you every day.

Here are some things you can do for someone who has lost their beloved animal:

Send a sympathy card to one who has lost a pet.

Connect them with support:
Pet Loss Support Hotline at UC Davis Center for Companion Animal Health -- "The compassionate people who staff the Pet Loss Support Hotline understand the emotional attachment people can form with animals of any kind."

Pet Loss Support Hotline at Cornel University College of Veterinary Medicine -- "The hotline is staffed by volunteer veterinary students who have undergone extensive training with professional grief counselors."


Post a Tribute
Several websites offer the opportunity to write a tribute to a beloved pet:
Pet Tributes Page of Chance’s Spot Pet Loss and Support Resources

Memorial Markers
Consider honoring the loss with a stone memorial:
Say it in Stone
4EverInMyHeart


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Michael Crichton, the legendary author and Hollywood producer, died last week. His death shocked everyone. He was a relatively young man at age 66, and was taken by cancer.

I knew Dr. Crichton because he had graduated from Harvard Medical School several years before I started there. When I was a first year medical student, he was already a famous author with both the Andromeda Strain (about a viral plague that devastates humanity) and Terminal Man (about the impact of deep brain implants on psychosurgery). He had been invited as a guest to a writer’s symposium where he, along with Robin Cook (the author of Coma and also a Harvard physician), would speak to the largely medical audience.

I had always been interested in writing and was intrigued by a doctor who walked away from his career as a physician to pursue full-time writing. I had been deeply affected by Terminal Man, as I already knew that I wanted to be a neurosurgeon. I was drawn to the implications that operations on the brain could produce profound alterations in a patient’s personality and behavior. Dr. Crichton was an imposingly tall man, nearly 6 feet 6 inches tall. I was scared to death to go meet him. But he saw a copy of Terminal Man in my hands, waved me over, and graciously signed it.

At that point, I could not resist asking him if he ever missed not being able to take care of patients. He said: “In some ways, it is regrettable but, in others, inevitable because I think they are many physicians who could practice medicine better than I ever could but very few of them who are able write about Medicine the way I do, trying to see to what ends—good and evil--new discoveries and techniques of Medicine can be put.”

He was right. He made a far greater contribution to our culture’s understanding of what can occur when the limits of science cross the borders of morality. The topics he covered in his books and films covered the gamut, from stem cell research to the global threats of new viral mutations. From DNA transfer to the development of language in primates. From time travel to terrorism. From environmental catastrophe to the dangers of manipulating brain function.

Dr. Crichton’s genius and creativity will be sorely missed. His writing and his ideas will stand as a challenge to all of us who aspire to translate some of the pathos and ethos of the world of medicine into the written word.

Read More:
Visit the Michael Crichton web site

Wired Magazine Essay by Michael Crichton, "Mediasaurus"
“I want to focus on another dinosaur, one that may be on the road to extinction. I am referring to the American media. And I use the term extinction literally. To my mind, it is likely that what we now understand as the mass media will be gone within ten years. Vanished, without a trace.”

ZDNet -- America loses its moral technologist: Michael Crichton

Most doctors dread the notion of a universal health care plan run by the government. However, we must realize that there is something morally objectionable to one of the richest countries in the world having citizens—working parents and their children—who are suffering, and even dying, because they simply cannot afford to get medical attention. Wall Street can get bailed out in a matter of a few weeks. But for more than two decades, our Congress has been unable or unwilling to develop a coherent national healthcare agenda while the numbers of the uninsured continue to swell.

Now more than forty six million Americans are without health care coverage. And these numbers were tabulated before the Great Recession of 2008 hit. How many more, in the current financial crisis, will give up healthcare coverage to keep food on the table or a roof over their heads?
America aspires to greatness, but has fallen short while so many among us are left behind. Lives have been ruined when families must choose between bankruptcy and medical attention.

Our country is rapidly turning into a two-tier society—those who can afford health care and those who can’t. It is as if we’ve grown comfortable, as a nation, to have a third world colony in the midst of a first world country. We’ve grown complacent allowing a group of our countrymen and women to become second-class citizens in our midst, denied basic, fundamental healthcare. We have deprived them of the first and most fundamental of human rights: the right to life.

Sure, the costs of healthcare are rising. The US spends the most money on healthcare of any country in the world. Yet our country is ranked, according to the World Health Organization, thirty-eighth in the world for quality. That means we can look to thirty-seven other countries for ways to make our healthcare more efficient and higher quality. It’s time to look. And look hard. We need to correct this fundamental flaw in our country. We need to do what’s right. Yes, it will be a bureaucratic nightmare to administer such a system. So will bailing out the banks. Yes, it will expensive. But letting families go uncovered, letting disease go untreated, and prevention go unaddressed also carries a cost—not just financial. A moral one, too.

For more reading:
Almanac of Policy Issues: Universal Health Care Coverage

The Washington Post: Universal Health Coverage Attracts New Support - Onetime Foes Become Unlikely Advocates, Citing Rising Costs and Tougher Access

MedScape from WebMD Census Bureau: Number of U.S. Uninsured Rises to 47 Million Americans are Uninsured: Almost 5 Percent Increase Since 2005

Everyday Citizen Health Coverage: Why Are People Uninsured?

CBS News: Diagnosing The Health Care Debate

Stand Up for Health Care Uninsured Americans