Happy Thanksgiving

Today is a milestone on a couple of different levels here in Baghdad. The 25th of November happens to be precisely seven months since I swiped my I.D. card at a machine in Kuwait to mark the start of my deployment clock in the Iraqi theater. More significant, I think, is the passage of Thanksgiving 7,000 miles away from home.

It is by no means my first holiday in theater, of course. Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Columbus Day, and Veteran’s Day have all come and gone on my watch here beside the Tigris River. Each requires distinct reflections, and each is associated with its own traditional observations. But none equate to the concept of “home” quite like Thanksgiving does.

And so my own personal reflections and observations must adjust to this unwelcome reality. My little gang of analysts began the day at 0900 with a leisurely 4-mile walk, sort of providing the excuse for the culinary excess to come. The walk ended just as a flag football game began between two organizations I share a large cubicle farm with. I had a little down time after the game to have a cup of coffee and write this blurb before the next event, which is an Iraqi lunch in the office provided by our colleague Haidur. That will, in all likelihood, convince me of the need to sneak into the gym before heading to the dining facility in the afternoon for the massive Thanksgiving meal for which military mess halls are renowned.

I anticipate no earnest effort by anyone to engage in real work after dinner (not that any effort is being made before then, either), so that becomes the cue for folks to retreat to their CHUs and begin connecting with their loved ones back home. Bandwidth is always a challenge here and will no doubt be doubly challenging with the expected demand placed on Skype today.

With the adjustments to the holiday observation pretty much established, I’ll turn now to reflections. First and foremost involves the giving of thanks. It becomes pretty clear after spending a short amount of time in a place like Iraq that I and every fellow countryman of mine should drop to our knees every day and thank God we were born Americans. We certainly have long lists of peeves, gripes, and topics of grave concern, but the lights come on every time we hit the switch, the water is drinkable right from the tap, and it never crosses our minds that when we leave the house to visit or shop we might die a violent death. Go ahead and complain about potholes and school budgets – it’s your civic duty – but be thankful that these are the types of things that make your life difficult.

The big reflection on this day is, of course, family. Weirdly, I have pretty much zero concern about the ability of my family to take care of themselves and keep the home fires burning while I’m away. Susie has been managing so much, for so long, that I rarely have any troubling thoughts about the family’s ability to cope. However, I am fretting a great deal about the turkey and, more importantly, the gravy. These are my Thanksgiving tasks, usually begun immediately after reading the morning paper and culminating with the Last Task before serving, which is making gravy from the turkey drippings.

It will all get done, and done well, but it is what I think about on Thanksgiving, a comfortable routine that is traditionally a prelude to a wonderful day spent with family and friends, food and wine, fun and frivolity. This one hits home more than any other holidays, because this one is all about being thankful for what you have and you just can’t escape the fact that it all is, temporarily, just beyond your reach.

Happy Thanksgiving to all.