"Why is everything a performance with you, Tony?" 🔊🆙️ pic.twitter.com/xSK6FhlA78
— Paul Bronks (@SlenderSherbet) November 23, 2022
I hope you all my fellow Americans had a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday!
Bev invited me over for a small turkey day feast, and I am so grateful to have been invited!
A lot of memories return to me at Thanksgiving, probably means more to me than any other holiday. I grew up in a fringe Christian sect that did not celebrate Christmas because of its origins in the Roman Saturnalia holiday. They were correct about that, but the truth is even the Old Testament holiday were borrowed from earlier civilizations and customs. So Thanksgiving became a time of family and friend get togethers in my family. There were a lot of conundrums with my religious upbringing, its strictness and discipline were perhaps helpful, and I was always the oddball in elementary school, so later in life I had no problem being different and believing "different". I never fit into the mainstream. But also I missed out on a lot of things must young people experience. There were right about Christmas (Saturnalia), Easter (goddess Astarte) and Halloween (nobody even denies that was pagan) not being of Christian origin. But never seem to get that baptisms came out of India and river Ganges, and all the borrowed things found in Christianity including tales from the Epic of Gilgamesh and other ancient stories.
Do I care Christmas was pagan? No. But I am aware the Catholic Church repurposed the Roman Holiday in a marketing move. I really didn't want my daughter to experience the ostracism I got for my beliefs as a child. I didn't forbid my daughter keeping Christmas, we had a tree, and when she asked if Santa was real, I didn't lie to her. When she asked me if Santa was real, I told her "You know how Mickey Mouse is a character of Disneyland? Santa is a character of Christmas. She totally got it. Kids know what it's like to pretend and they understand marketing. They know what entertainment is.
My dad always invited to Thanksgiving those who didn't have anywhere to go, like eccentric gold prospectors, inventors and one guy who believed in hollow earth, my dad thought that was a bit nuts but they did share a common love of gems and minerals and he was friends with him before his hollow earth phase. Dad was a "rock hound" and liked his mineral loving friends. I wish I had some of the crystals my dad had, but he didn't use them energetically. I remember going hunting for desert rose crystals near Camp Verde AZ.
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| Desert Rose selenium crystal |
We sat at the little kids table with olives on our fingers and we always had a good time. Mom was an astounding cook, especially with cheesecakes, nobody ever left a crumb on their plates!
Got to make some tough decisions in the next few days as to where I go next. There appears to be a good deal of price fixing in apartment rentals by these real estate investment trusts. But I know I will find something. Maybe even the unexpected surprise.
