It was Canadian Thanksgiving yesterday, and I got several texts from friends wishing me a "Happy Turkey Day". I also had several sales people at the farmers market wish me a "Good Thanksgiving".

I'm really not quiote sure about celebrating Thanksgiving. I know it's a version of the Harvest Festival you'd find at the Church of England, but there is also still that cultural reference back to the plantation at Plymouth Rock and the Pilgrim Fathers. I'm not sure an act of 17th century imperialism, with the associated subjegation of native peoples, is truly worthy of celebration.

I feel more comfotable about the Canadian version, with them choosing a different day, and explicitly referring to the harvest, and not to the start of european settlement. Quite why in 1957 they found it necessary to make it an official religous, rather than secular, festival, I'm not sure: "A Day of General Thanksgiving to Almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed … to be observed on the 2nd Monday in October."