An Old Fashioned Thanksgiving

Words: 454
Pages: 2

“Keep your eyes open to your mercies. The man who forgets to be thankful has fallen asleep in life.” This quote, by Robert Louis Stevenson, shows that people should be thankful, not only on Thanksgiving day, but also every day of the year. Thanksgiving is the time of year to give thanks for all of life’s blessings. Although the overall meaning of Thanksgiving has stayed the same, many aspects of how the holiday is celebrated have changed. In the movie, “An Old Fashioned Thanksgiving,” many differences in the way Thanksgiving is celebrated in the 1800’s are depicted. A considerable difference is the way they prepare the turkey for the Thanksgiving dinner. Turkeys were raised with the intent of being consumed for the gathering. It was a long process of cleaning the turkey completely before being able to cook it. Additionally, most times, extended family members were not present for the feast. Often, relatives lived great distances apart from each other, making it difficult to gather in one place together. Another distinction is the fact that vegetable were grown by oneself. They had to make sure they had enough to …show more content…
A prime example of this is the amount of technology that we have in present times. Many people seem to be distracted by their cellphones and handheld games instead of enjoying time with their families. Another disparity is the way we obtain and prepare our turkeys. Turkeys are bought at the grocer’s and stored in the freezer until it is time to defrost them. Then, it is a simple matter of cleaning out the giblets and cooking the turkey to their liking. An additional discrepancy between Thanksgiving from the past and present celebrations is the company of extended family members during the gatherings. Today, it is much easier for families to gather to spend the holiday together due to air travel. Also, families typically do not live great distances from each other in current