Thanksgiving Thoughts

I really do love this holiday, even though this year I am kind of cutting it short in order to travel.  So I guess that I should start there, that I am grateful that the past couple of years I have been well enough to travel widely, and have managed to both travel to places that have long been on my to do list, and that I have been able to do things with family and friends as well.
The political climate has been such an incredible disaster that it is hard to know where to start being thankful and stop being angry, but I think that is the point.  Self-centered people who want power and control over people love the stirring up of great passions, both for and against them, and we have seen that continue to play out in our nation's leadership.  Fortunately, there have been some rays of hope with elections this month.  The first is that people showed up.  They weren't quite as outraged as I would have hoped, and seemingly decent people had very morally bankrupt ideas about what is and is not acceptable to perpetrate on your fellow man.  The attack on the free press and the incitement of violence has prompted not unsubstantiated comparisons with fascism and nationalism.  The youth vote in particular, was encouraging.  More to be done, but I am thankful for the engagement, and the fact that over a 100 women will be in the next Congress, many of them of color.  It is about time and I am very thankful about that.