Well, Thanksgiving is less than a week away and I was thinking about my Thanksgivings over the years. I’ve spent Thanksgiving in a lot of different places and with a lot of different people. Thanksgiving, like all holidays, has its own set of traditions like the turkey, watching football and Macy’s parade — but a lot of traditions have disappeared over the years….
A lot of people still send Christmas cards and of course kids (especially) trade Valentine’s cards, but around the turn of the 20th century, people also used to send Thanksgiving cards, that had illustrations of pumpkins, turkeys, pilgrims, etc. — the verses conveyed seasonal sentiments of thanks.
When I was little, there was always a kids’ table at Thanksgiving — it seemed like a tradition to separate the kids and adults during dinner. That doesn’t seem to be the case today — the entire family usually sits together around the table, regardless of age.
It hasn’t been that many years ago when you sat down for dinner on special occasions, like Thanksgiving or Christmas, there were usually place cards on the table. Most people don’t use place cards anymore. That was one of the more formal Thanksgiving traditions that hasn’t stood the test of time.
Special meals on holidays like Thanksgiving, used to call for using the family’s finest china and silverware. But today, no one wants to spend a day polishing those special knives, forks and spoons that were too good to be put into the dishwasher and that were probably inherited from the grandparents. Most families just stick with the everyday dishes and silverware on Turkey Day.
I remember a lot of families made it an annual tradition to retell the story of the first Thanksgiving before starting to eat. Today everyone around the table can just access the history of Thanksgiving on their phones…. and people do use their phones during the Thanksgiving meal — but I’m pretty sure they’re not reading about the first Thanksgiving.
One activity that I remember well is the wishbone tradition. This tradition is much older than even I am — in Ancient Roman times, chicken bones embodied good luck. So, when two people pulled apart a wishbone, the person left with the larger piece was, in theory, rewarded with good luck or granted a wish. Breaking of the wishbone was something I always looked forward to. But today, you hardly ever even hear it mentioned. Probably because the wishbone has to dry out before it will break — that means waiting…. patiently. That doomed the wishbone ritual for today’s culture of instant gratification.
I guess that’s the thing with traditions — they usually adapt to the times, morph into something different, or fade away entirely.
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