I legit forget Thanksgiving is tied to racist myths until it comes up on Twitter every fall. I think this is because I don't have children getting spoon-fed those racist myths.

1/

For me it's about harvest and thankfulness and everything that's good about the darkest time of the year: gathering with loved ones, enjoying good food, telling stories, and lighting candles and fires to warm us up. Celebrating in the face of the coming cold.

2/

It's also in many ways the easiest holiday for a multi-religious family to celebrate.

3/

That said, I pledge to have some conversations with my nieces and honorary niblings about this as they grow up and get taught the racist myths (hoping God and a vaccine make this possible).

4/

I will also re-read Robin Wall Kimmerer's essay "Allegiance to Gratitude," about the Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving Address, this year, and hope to teach my niblings about it someday.

5/

[Paused to take a call from our CSA farmer, whose CSA I bought into in the summer but not the winter. She said she just wanted to hear my voice and make sure we weren't experiencing food insecurity. Y'ALL. This right here is what I'm thankful for.]

6/

Personally, I can think of nothing so fulfilling as sharing with everyone I can Kimmerer's vision--and many Native visions--of belonging, responsibility, and mutual care.

7/

We can do better than we have done. We can be happier than we are. We can thrive--but only when we adopt a different mind-set than one of extraction, greed, and hoarding wealth.

We could make this place beautiful. We could live absolutely surrounded by beauty.

8/8