Thankful for Thanksgiving

I've never really written this, but I have certainly said many times that Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. Why? Let me count the ways:

1. Thanksgiving may be the only major holiday that has not been commercialized. There are no cards to buy, no gifts to give, no huge hype about Circuit City holding its Annual Pilgrim Sale; in fact, almost everything commercial is closed. Yes, "black Friday" is the day after, but that's a Christmas thing, not a Thanksgiving thing.

2. You don't have to believe anything dogmatic. I don't have to stand in a church and mutter something about the Thanksgiving Angel who came down from Heaven to rescue the people of Israel, holding a golden chalice in one hand and a magical spear in the other. I don't have to believe anything, and I don't have to pretend that cultural myths are the same as historical fact--all I need is to be thankful.

3. I've heard that there's some food involved. Thanksgiving is the #1 opportunity to pig out, and even for us vegetarians, who don't "pig" too much, there's a lot to like. It's a time to loosen the belt, chow down, and ease into a food-induced stupor. Food is my drug of choice.

4. By its nature, Thanksgiving emphasizes personal connections. People spend some quality and quantity time with those who are near and dear to them. It's one of the few truly family-focused events of the year. (One could say that Christmas also qualifies, but all the gifts and glitter and hustle 'n' bustle can kind of obscure all that.)

5. It's near my birthday. And in fact, this year Thanksgiving is ON my birthday! And when my birthday rolls around, at least the level of physical and verbal abuse I receive wanes a bit, and there are even a few presents to be had. What's not to like about that?

I'd say those are five reasons that work for me. Happy Thanksgiving to all of my thousands of devoted readers from Singapore to Cincinnati. There's a lot to be thankful for. (And if you don't like sentences that end in prepositions, there's a lot for which to be thankful!)

Obama the Antichrist

Oh please, say it ain't so! I'm reading "Belief Watch" by Lisa Miller in the current issue of Newsweek, and I discover that there's a website called RaptureReady.com that is obsessed with the apocalypse and the rapture. And we learn that the head of this site, a fellow by the name of Todd Strandberg, even has a "Rapture Index." For some unknown reason, if the index goes over 160, "fasten your seat belts." And--gulp--Obama's win pushed the index to 161! (Ah, the mystical appeal of putting something into numbers. But, these numbers can and do change. As noted in the site, some 45 factors are taken into account; the index has been as high as 170 in 2008, and even today, shortly after the Newsweek column, the index is down to 159--whew, good news!)

So how can Obama be the Antichrist? Well, recently one of the winning lottery numbers in Obama's home state of Illinois was 666--need we say more, or think more? Seems self-evident that Barack is it. Not only that, but he's a nice guy! According to Miller's column, the Antichrist "will be a sweet-talking world leader who gathers governments and economies under his command to further his own evil agenda." I'm sure we can all remember Barack's platform, which included his daily call for Total World Domination.

At this website I found that there are other eerie, spooky signs of the Second Coming. Did you know that JFK got 666 votes for the Democratic nomination at the 1956 DNC? Did you know that Ronald Wilson Reagan has six letters in each of his three names? Did you know that numerologically, both the names of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and William Jefferson Clinton (supposedly) add up to 666? And did you know that the Contentious Introvert once ate 666 kernels of niblets corn in a single sitting? We're talking convergence here.

All this stuff would be funny....if it wasn't funny. According to Miller, one-third of white evangelicals believe the world will end in their lifetimes. I can only regard such beliefs as mass hysteria, colossal ignorance, and total idiocy. A significant portion of my professional life is devoted to helping people think more clearly, but it's an uphill battle. Whether I pass on tomorrow or 50 years from tomorrow, I fear that these yahoos will still be around, poisoning the brains of any gullible person who wants to believe them.

The limits to voting

Now that the 2008 election is a memory (although still not a distant memory!), it's worth observing that many people are proud to have done their civic duty--they have voted. And of course, given a choice between not voting and voting, going to the polls is the better choice. However, my concern is that civic involvement is often equated with voting, as if it is the only relevant or important political act. Some people may say to themselves, "I've done my duty; voting is what politics is all about; I voted, and now I can kick up my feet and rest until the next election in 2010."

However, the reality is that there are lots of political activites that are way more effective and way more important than simply voting. For example, my mom was a lobbyist for the state AFL-CIO. She testified in state legislative committee hearings on a wide variety of bills; her input and that of her organization had real impact at times. Showing up at your local city council meeting has more impact than one vote in November has; so too with writing a letter to one's representative, or the local newspaper, or trying to influence friends and neighbors, or volunteering to work for an organization that promotes specific stands on specific issues.

In short, voting is just the tip of the political iceberg. If you voted, good for you--but don't think that vote is the be-all and end-all of political participation. It simply isn't.

Books in my life

When I graduated from college, way-back-when, I obviously had a Bachelor's Degree, but I still felt pretty ignorant. And so I spent a fair amount of time in my 20s reading, trying to fill in at least a few of the gaps. I realized that I had I had never read Moby Dick, never read Crime and Punishment, and so on.

Out of that experience I came to know many works that have stayed with me over the years. Some probably demand a re-reading; I wonder if they would hold up with the passage of time. But among my most influential books are these ten:

• The Age of Reason by Jean Paul Sartre - got me thinking about existentialism in an artistic way
• Irrational Man by William Barrett - got me thinking about existentialism in an academic way
• Tropic of Capricorn by Henry Miller - freed me up to think a little more radically
• Even Cowgirls Get the Blues by Tom Robbins - ditto
• Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov - double ditto (and he's quite the wordsmith, too)
• The Future of an Illusion by Sigmund Freud - helped me understand the psychology of religion
• Why I Am Not a Christian by Bertrand Russell - made me realize the shortcomings of dogma
• The End of Faith by Sam Harris - a more recent read, but an important one
• Earthwalk by Philip Slater - got me to re-think Western culture and its values
• Animal Liberation by Peter Singer - propelled me toward vegetarianism

Of course, it's also worth mentioning The World According to Garp, Gandhi: An Autobiography, The Jungle, Breakfast of Champions (Vonnegut), Thus Spake Zarathustra (Nietzsche), The Faith of a Heretic (Walter Kaufmann), Fear of Flying (Erica Jong), and Teaching as a Subversive Activity (Postman & Weingartner). Suffice it to say that the world of books has been an important world that has shaped my view of just about everything. As with my fairly recent post about songs (October 13), feel free to nominate your personal favorites--I'm always looking for something that's worth reading.