Is Thanksgiving worth celebrating in the days of COVID?

Way back in the 17th Century, Pilgrims in Massachusetts started a tradition we still recognize today – they celebrated the first Thanksgiving. It was a celebration of the harvest. It was a celebration of life since the harvest offered the sustenance necessary for survival at a time when survival was hardly guaranteed.

The story goes that 102 pilgrims made the journey on the Mayflower. Of those who survived the trip, and the first winter in the new continent, only 53 pilgrims were left to celebrate the first Thanksgiving. That means that the harsh conditions of a long sea voyage in the age of sail, and of hacking out an existence in the wilderness of a New World, had cost almost 50 percent of pilgrims their lives. For those who sat down to Thanksgiving dinner, the celebration was very real, even if they had heavy hearts for those they had lost.

Today, 399 years later, we are approaching another Thanksgiving. This holiday, we are facing a threats to our health – the coronavirus. Customary Thanksgiving celebrations will be tempered this year. For those who usually attend large gatherings for the holiday, this year, the gatherings will be smaller. This has already proven true as the grocery stores are selling more smaller turkeys than ever before. How then should we be thankful when we face this global pandemic?

Is it possible that the conditions under which we’ll celebrate this Thanksgiving will help to create a stronger bridge to the past and that first celebration? It helps to remember that everyone at the first Thanksgiving had experienced close personal loss. That was a fact of life people recognized in 17th Century and for many years after. Today, modern medicine has performed such miracles that the costs of this disease come as something of a shock. But if we look at every day as a blessing and a miracle, the truth is that we have much to be grateful for.

Living here in McHenry, Wonder Lake, Richmond, Ringwood, and Johnsburg, we have the good fortune to live in peace. We have economic opportunity, even if, for some of us, access is delayed by the coronavirus. While our hearts go out to those who have lost loved ones to the disease, and for all the hardships we have faced, the cost of COVID has not proven as deadly as was first predicted by the experts. And with news of new vaccines, there is light at the end of the tunnel.

On Thanksgiving, we hope that you will sit down with as many friends and family as is safely possible. We hope you will enjoy a wonderful meal and will enjoy the company of friends in the hearth of your homes knowing that the coronavirus will pass and we will soon return to the splendor of living in McHenry County when things are back to normal.

Comments

Is your antifreeze safe from freezing this Richmond winter

You still have time to have it checked Well, there’s no denying it – winter tends to get chilly here in Richmond. We have to deal with snow and ice on the roads, scraping the same off our windows and windshield, and staying warm while we drive. Of course, you had your antifreeze checked before winter rolled into town. What?! You didn’t have your antifreeze checked before winter clamped down on Richmond? So, how’s your antifreeze doing? If you haven’t had it checked, there’s really no way of knowing, is there? This car has overheated in the middle of a Richmond winter. But, on the other end of the spectrum, the antifreeze can also freeze if it's not up to its job. Hopefully, you haven’t had a serious problem with your antifreeze already. If you did, you’d probably know. When antifreeze fails, it’s a potentially catastrophic condition for your vehicle’s engine. You could have hoses that have burst because of freezing antifreeze. Worse than that, your engine block may have crac...

Blocks of ice falling from cars in McHenry could cause accidents or damage

We’ve all seen those blocks of snow falling from behind the rear tires of a car when the snow rolls into McHenry . Fortunately, they’re just packed snow that will disintegrate under your vehicle’s tires as you simply drive right through them, right? Don’t count on it. Those blocks of snow are often packed so tight, condensed by the thaw-and-freeze cycle, that they’re anything but oversized snowballs . They’re often more like boulders. Hit one of those blocks and the collision between the block and one of your tires could send you careening off the road or into oncoming traffic. In some cases, they’re so solid you could pound them with a sledgehammer with little effect. They truly can represent a serious road hazard. The problem is that it’s difficult to tell how solidly they’re packed when you see them on the road, left their unwittingly by another driver. Either way, your best bet is to try to avoid them. But you want to be careful dodging blocks of ice in the road, too. You need...

Get out to McHenry Music Festival for a good time and music near to home

Some folks here in McHenry will load up the car and head out to Red Rock Amphitheater near Denver to see a show. Some will go to the MSG Sphere near Las Vegas. Some will go to the Bonaroo Festival Concert to see a show. That’s quite a bit of driving and you’d better make sure your vehicle is up to the trip. What happens, however, if something goes wrong – if your vehicle breaks down while driving there or back? What happens if the show is canceled, as happened this year with the Bonaroo Festival? We’re talking about some serious inconvenience, aren’t we? Wherever you go, whether your driving to Colorado, Nevada, Tennessee or anywhere else in this continent, you want to perform your due diligence and make sure the vehicle is up for the trip before you go. And it doesn’t really matter if you’re driving somewhere to see some live music or for any other purpose. A breakdown can be costly and may put you at the mercy of weather conditions or nefarious characters that come across you while y...

Performance Unlimited Blog

Search This Blog