AS usual at this time of year, the media blares the news in one form or another that today is Thanksgiving Day in the United States of America. Jamaica benefits through the tourism industry, from the USA’s Thanksgiving Day by Americans who travel to Jamaica whether they remember to give thanks or not, simply because it is a long weekend, especially if they can get the Friday off from work.

When Abraham Lincoln promulgated the American Thanksgiving in 1863, he had in mind a national day of giving thanks for the end of the civil war and, by extension, the advances that the USA had made from the time of George Washington 80-something years earlier. He did not know that it would become the signal for the start of the shopping season for Christmas in the USA. Add to that the fact that Christmas itself is not really celebrated according to its original religious meaning in many places anymore.

The word ‘holiday’ is derived from the two words holy and day. It does appear that regarding holy day celebrations, in any country, if there are no prophets like those in the Bible to remind people of the original meaning of the event then it will be simply taken as a day off from work. And, after a time, those who enjoy the day will not even know its meaning. Indeed, all Christian holidays are not properly observed today.

Jamaica has its National Thanksgiving day in October of each year, and it falls on the day before National Heroes Day. But before we even reached the stage of developing a culture of thanksgiving its meaning was lost. Many Jamaicans do not even know that the day before National Heroes Day is National Thanksgiving Day. Indeed, in Jamaica a habit has developed over many decades that whenever one comments in favour of giving thanks, others believe that the person doing so is making a political statement in favour of the ruling political party.

But it does not matter which party is in power. We still need to give thanks, even if it is only for life itself. We need to learn how to count our blessings. It is the only way to be happy as it gives

us a sense of personal achievement and motivates us to work harder in the future. However, it does not mean that criticisms should not be made when necessary.

Some will ask immediately what is there to be thankful for. Sixty-six years ago, in 1948, Dale Carnegie wrote the book How to stop worrying and start living. It is still a best-seller today. I was handed a copy of this book by my father when I was 13 years old as a way of controlling my asthma, since worrying is known to bring on an asthma attack. Included in his book was learning how to give thanks.

Carnegie wrote about a multimillionaire leaving in his will money for his relatives. One of the relatives, on receiving a million dollars in the days when “a million was really a million” in terms of value, complained about how mean and stingy his father or uncle was, since that ancestor was so rich yet all he left him was a ‘measly’ million.

I recall this every time someone talks nonsense about Jamaica being better off under The Queen. I recall the passage of the Bible where the Jews criticised Moses for carrying them out in the wilderness when they would have been better off under Pharaoh in the wilderness.

I have written about the advancements in public utilities in recent times. Once upon a time in Jamaica, whenever people complained, someone would say ‘Mind God tek weh yuh blessings’. My mother had a sign hung up in our family home that read: “I had no shoes and I complained until I met a man who had no feet.”

Did you know that the rate of suicides is highest in so-called First-World countries? Is it because Jamaica is more physically advanced than previously why the rate of suicides is climbing in Jamaica? Is it because some people despair when they do not give thanks?

I sympathise with everyone who has worked hard but have not been able to see the sort of benefits that should come with that sort of effort. It is one of the disadvantages of the capitalist system, that only a relative few will see the benefits of their hard labour.

I suspect that some of the privileged few prefer the present system, so that people will always be dependent on them for handouts rather than be

self-sufficient. Nevertheless, we have a lot to be thankful for, and, at the same time, we still have a lot to struggle for. I salute the older people in this country who have spent their time explaining to the children that things were not always this way.

In the old days, many people had chickens and goats at their homes. We ate salt fish and salt mackerel, which are still with us. We also ate salt beef, salt pork, and salted ham at Christmas. Today, refrigeration has changed all of that and, as a result, we eat more chicken meat today and consume far less salt.

Decades ago, many people said that they did not eat “fridge food”. We do not hear that anymore, even in the rural areas, because just about everyone eats only fridge food today.

In the days of no refrigeration, Jamaicans ate a lot of beef. It explains the words “hash and roast beef, mince and pie” in the traditional Jamaica College cheer. And, speaking of JC, congratulations to my alma mater on winning the Manning Cup again.

There are many people who hail from St Thomas yet have relatives in Westmoreland because cows were transported by cow hands on horseback from one end of Jamaica to the other. It took weeks to make the journey and there were sexual liaisons on the overnight stops hence the amount of miles between relatives.

ekrubm765@yahoo.com