Thanksgiving traditions, change and family

By: Samantah Ghan, Opinions writer, [email protected]

Thanksgiving in my family has always been a big ordeal. There is turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole, Jell-O and pies upon pies. Growing up we never had extended family around to celebrate the holidays with. We lived across the country from all our extended family.

In 2006 my dad retired and our family moved. All of a sudden we were 10 minutes away from a ton of family. That first year living in Utah was so different than any other holiday season we had in Florida. There were weather changes, leaves to rack, snow to shovel and best of all, family to celebrate the holidays with.

I learned change is ok. Tradition by definition means “a way of thinking, behaving, or doing something that had been used by the people in a particular group, family, society for a long time.” By this definition, traditions never change, but that is not real life. Change happens, it is about how we accept and go along with the change that makes life better and us happier in the long run.

This Thanksgiving none of my family is getting together for dinner. When my parents told me, I was really upset. But after I heard how my sisters, who are both married and have many families to visit on the holiday, expressed how it would make their day easier I realized that this change was a good thing. It made my sisters happy, it made my parents happy, so I guess I can be happy as well. Turns out I will get my parents all to myself, which is something that doesn’t happen very often.

Traditions have to fit our current lifestyle. That means they have to change. As people and families, we need to accept that fact. It is all about how we take the change to make ourselves happy. The Thanksgiving holiday is all about being thankful for everything that we do have.  Be thankful for the traditions that you do have and be thankful for those traditions are changing to fit your current life style.

I’m thankful for being able to spend time with my parents. I’m thankful for being able to go to school and work. But most of all I’m thankful for the knowledge that traditions change and I can accept that. Now everyone else needs to get to that point as well.