Life: giving thanks

I was asked recently what my favorite holiday was, and with little thought I answered, “Thanksgiving.” It is, for me, a time solely dedicated to gratitude. Little bad can be said of gratitude, whereas other holidays in my experience are overrun by commercialism and/or silly traditionalist dogmatism (“don’t you go calling that thing a holiday tree!”).

Sure, it’s a holiday commemorating the turning point in the European invasion and colonization of North America, the subsequent horrors imposed upon the native inhabitants unmentioned, but… for me Thanksgiving has little to do with pilgrims and Native Americans, and a lot to do with family and friends.

It’s a simple holiday here. Three ingredients: family, friends and food (LOTS of food, this is an AMERICAN holiday after all). Family: well, my sister couldn’t make it this year – working too much at her fancy job in L.A. She’s an “Associate Producer” now for a talk show there, which is, I’m told, quite a good thing. She works crazy hours, but makes good enough money, and hopefully (hopefully!) she’ll be out of that crazy town soon enough. My brother is his same old self, quiet, witty, and to the point. He stopped by for Thanksgiving dinner for about 40 minutes and headed off to seek out an elk before sunset. My father is like my brother (and myself), laid back, working along – probably too much, making grand plans for the future, not taking the greatest care of himself now though. My mother is the matriarch, the one who holds the family together, the one who makes the holidays seem so easy.

Friends: well I don’t know. Last year we had 15 over for dinner, this year just 2: my mother’s friend Sherry and her daughter, Emily. It was nice though, informal. I missed my friends back in Missoula (who I’ll join tomorrow for festivities there), and even more so, my friends back in England and around the world, many of whom I may never see again. I certainly terribly miss Ana. I long for the time when we can pass days and nights together without thought of an impending day when one of us must say goodbye again and board a plane bound for a distant land.

And on that note, speaking of family and friends, I have some pictures of times and people for which I am personally grateful:

Going way back in time… My grandfather Whitaker (some time in the late 1940s I think)
My mother, my father’s mother and grandmother, my sister in my father’s arms, and my grandfather holding my older brother (late 70s).

Me! with my mother (around 1980).

My dad! All I can do is laugh at this one (or cringe… – date unknown).
Soorjya, me, Ana, SJ, and Shahiz at Clifton Downs in Bristol, just a short walk from Hodgkin House where we all lived together (with about 45 others from across the globe) – from India, USA, Spain, Singapore and France respectively (June, 2005).

Me with my friends Suzanne and Achintya, landing on the Aran Islands in Ireland, part of our ‘spiritual pilgrimage’ (as Suzanne told the imigration official for the ‘purpose’ of our journey) to see Geshe Michael Roach and Christie McNally in Galway (July 2005).

Ana and I at Federica’s (aka Fede, from Italy) birthday dinner (July 2005).

Native style boats near Waikiki beach, Honolulu, Hawaii – with Diamond Head in the background (January 2006). It was there that I presented my Bristol dissertation work for the first time. It was there that I got a very much needed recharge of sunshine (Missoula winters do a number on me). I also met two wonderful friends: Feliz, a Turkish Muslim woman giving a paper on gender and swear words; and Balbinder, a Sikh professor in Canada who gave his paper on Derrida and the objectification of foreigners by European colonialists.

Here I am today, at my parents home in Helena.

Here is my beautiful girlfriend Ana, in the middle, with friends Eriko and Lourdes – last weekend in Bristol.

So that is my little tribute of thanks. It is, of course, extremely limited: a little family, a few friends, some boats in Hawaii. But it’s where I’m at. And while my heart is tugged (man, Hawaii is sounding nicer and nicer) by thoughts of those who are so far away (she’s in Orihuela, Spain now, approximately 5000 miles from Helena Montana), I am happy. I’m happy because my life has been so full of wonderful people, exciting travels, wonderful studies, and lots and lots and lots of love. For that I am very fortunate, and very grateful.

One (not so) tiny concluding note: one thing I’ve meant to write about recently has been death. It’s been on my mind through several friends, students, and family members who have lost people close to them recently. Nacho, over at Woodmore Village has a couple very good posts here and here on the topic. I’ve brought it directly into my meditations lately and found, more than anything, questions and uncertainty. But then today I realized: it’s exactly the same when I meditate on love. Six years studying philosophy and religion and I’m still a complete fool in the face of love and death. It’s humbling.