Topic: Thanksgiving

So, Let’s consider: Are we really thankful? 0

Posted by on in Christianity, Giving Thanks, Holidays, Thanksgiving



So, Let’s consider: Are we really thankful?

It’s the weekend after the Thanksgiving holiday. I’m sure that the stores are packed with all those materialists looking for the best sales of things that they think they need but haven’t got. I guess they call it Black Friday for a reason. Then there’s Cyber Monday when I’m sure the internet will be crammed with the same people buying yet more stuff they think they need. I’m reminded of the George Carlin skit on people and their “stuff” – I’m sure you can find it on youtube.

You really have to hand it to marketing types that excel at convincing people to part with their hard earned cash for things they really don’t need, or in many cases break out that well worn credit card for the same.

During seasons that have are being redefined by monetarization and gifting, do we ever get back to the real reasons for Thanksgiving? That of giving thanks.

Of all the holiday seasons, I find that I appreciate Thanksgiving the most. Unlike many other religious centric holiday seasons (Easter, Christmas, etc.), it’s one that actually has a solid base in actual history and fact. No, I’m not doubting the birth, death and resurection of the Christ child, but celebrating it on a formerly pagan feast for Nimrod or the winter solstice, etc, or His resurrection during the Feast of Ishtar are events that I personally find problematic.

I don’t think I have to recount the origins of Thanksgiving. It’s well known that it was a time when peoples of different faiths, nationalities, personal and social priorities, and many other diffentiating aspects of life, gathered together to give thanks. They gave thanks to each other, they were thankful for what they had, they were thankful to their God and his beneficence. It was a time of positive celebration, of coming together in commonness. It would appear they set aside what divided them and concentrated on that which unified them.

So, in this ever increasing materialistic centric world, let’s be reminded to be thankful for the simple things. For friendship. For freedom. For our country, and if you’re not a US citizen I would presume that you’re also thankful for things where you live and are from. For our God and his benevolence. For family. For the so many things that we’ve grown to take for granted as givens.

During this season, I would also invite you to extend your thanks to others that you may not even know. The homeless person on the street or local organizations that help others in need, and other peoples and groups. By helping them, you share the spirit of thanksgiving in ways that you may never realize or understand.

In these times of strife and mayhem, there’s so many reasons to give thanks.

Be thankful.

I’m Don Rima and that’s the view From Where I Stand.

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So, Let’s consider: Xmas shopping in the land of covid 0

Posted by on in Business 101, Christmas, Covid-19, Family, Let's Consider..., Restaurants and Eating Establishments, Thanksgiving, Walmart, Winter Solstice



So, Let’s consider: Xmas shopping in the land of covid

Well, it’s the first week of October! You know what that means, right? Yup, it’s time to start shopping for Christmas!

Frankly, I think all these stores bringing out all their xmas trinkets at the end of July is more than a bit overboard, overpowering, over uncalled for and in general over annoying. When I walk into a place like Walmart this morning and see rows and rows stacked full to the top with all kinds of xmas BS, I’m wondering why someone hasn’t done a terrorist act on the place for over merchandising the Winter Solstice. Frankly, it was a serious temptation.

This year brings with it the added concerns of how local, perhaps smaller, businesses are going to survive it to Thanksgiving, let alone the Winter Solstice celebration. And, I find myself asking: “What’s more important, making Jeff Bezos richer by shopping on Amazon or the Walmart family by shopping at Walmart stores…or is it more important to do what I can to help the local businesses through their covid struggles to survive?” I think the answer is simple: The locals win.

So, this year is going to be a bit different. Look to your local businesses for gift certificates. You may even have to ask for them as this may be a new product line that they’ve not thought of before. Look for your local bookstores, eating or drinking establishments, specialty stores, corner grocers, theaters, art stores, hobby and craft stores, even your local mechanic! Hey, everyone’s going to need an oil change SOMETIME next year! Get creative.

If you’re a small merchant, business, eating establishment, or whatever, be thinking about how you can market gift certificates for people to use your establishment creatively and in a means that would make for an acceptable and welcomed gift for them to give to someone else to have.

Now, I’ll also expand this to small business that may not be in your neighborhood. Personally I’ve dealt with a family owned and run bakery in Baltimore for years. Every year I call Maria Voccaro at Voccaro’s bakery for my panetone’s and cookies. They’re a family run group in Baltimore that I’ve dealt with for over 30 years and I’m not going to stop now. I use them as an example but all of us know of a small, local or not so local, that we can send our business to in this time of mutual need. We need our small businesses to survive. Small business is by far the largest portion of employment our country has. And, they need us as much as we need them.

Perhaps with our help this year, they’ll still be around next.

I’m Don Rima and that’s the view From Where I Stand.

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