Thankful
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A nice extra warm day of sunshine yesterday for the great American holiday of Thanksgiving. A drive north in the early afternoon for turkey dinner with the relatives, the wife's brother and family, which is our traditional place to be this day of the year. Some tradition feels good to me, a sort of marking of the passage of time and a quick measure of where I am in the grander flow. Just the other day I read some of my memoirs about my grandparents' home where the family had traditional celebratory dinners when I was a kid. I realized then, when reading of my memories, how our general cultural view of the holiday has changed.
I think many still value the older idea of family members coming together for a day of quiet recollection while sharing a cornucopian meal. Those people who run the air waves and want to monetize what is good and wholesome! I like the old approach to the holiday better. But that is only me and the taste I acquired in a long-gone era.
The marketing blather that heightens during the holidays really doesn't disturb me as much as it once did. I only wonder how much longer advertisers will attempt to control our destiny. I see great prospects for advancing a world of goodness, love, and respect for one another. The internet, for one, provides a powerful venue for real human beings to communicate worthy values with one another. Here I find individuals sharing their experiences, defining a more lucid and meaningful reality than the incantations of power-hungry and greed-based corporations.
Occasionally I will pick up my volume of love letters, "Meditations on the Soul", written by Marsilio Ficino, father of the Renaissance, and read some of his transforming words, such as this passage dated 26 September, 1480:
"I certainly trust, and my faith is not unfounded, that the one ruler of the stars and of men, who has till now miraculously saved you time and again from the threats of the stars and from the heinous hands of men, will of his mercy likewise save you in the future".
A few special people over 500 years ago, when days were dark, could see light beneath. It seems that we have the capacity to make healthy corrections to our culture, to make detours from our own dehumanizing pathways. I am so thankful.
I think many still value the older idea of family members coming together for a day of quiet recollection while sharing a cornucopian meal. Those people who run the air waves and want to monetize what is good and wholesome! I like the old approach to the holiday better. But that is only me and the taste I acquired in a long-gone era.
The marketing blather that heightens during the holidays really doesn't disturb me as much as it once did. I only wonder how much longer advertisers will attempt to control our destiny. I see great prospects for advancing a world of goodness, love, and respect for one another. The internet, for one, provides a powerful venue for real human beings to communicate worthy values with one another. Here I find individuals sharing their experiences, defining a more lucid and meaningful reality than the incantations of power-hungry and greed-based corporations.
Occasionally I will pick up my volume of love letters, "Meditations on the Soul", written by Marsilio Ficino, father of the Renaissance, and read some of his transforming words, such as this passage dated 26 September, 1480:
"I certainly trust, and my faith is not unfounded, that the one ruler of the stars and of men, who has till now miraculously saved you time and again from the threats of the stars and from the heinous hands of men, will of his mercy likewise save you in the future".
A few special people over 500 years ago, when days were dark, could see light beneath. It seems that we have the capacity to make healthy corrections to our culture, to make detours from our own dehumanizing pathways. I am so thankful.
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