Thanksgiving 2024

 Happy Thanksgiving!

Well it arrived all on its own. The latest date the holiday can be, but it is finally here and with it cold, wet weather; food; and football.

How could we possibly have waited for so long?

December begins on Sunday!

Until then we will have a steady diet of sports and leftovers.

Remember as you give thanks for the blessings in your life to give thanks for the first responders, military men and women and DoD civilians, and those who serve on the frontlines in our hospitals and care centers who are on duty today and every day. There are many people who do not get the day off, but who are out there making sure the rest of us are safe and can enjoy the blessings of liberty.

It has pleased Almighty God to prolong our national life another year, defending us with His guardian care against unfriendly designs from abroad and vouchsafing to us in His mercy many and signal victories over the enemy, who is of our own household. It has also pleased our Heavenly Father to favor as well our citizens in their homes as our soldiers in their camps and our sailors on the rivers and seas with unusual health. He has largely augmented our free population by emancipation and by immigration, while He has opened to us new sources of wealth and has crowned the labor of our workingmen in every department of industry with abundant rewards. Moreover, He has been pleased to animate and inspire our minds and hearts with fortitude, courage, and resolution sufficient for the great trial of civil war into which we have been brought by our adherence as a nation to the cause of freedom and humanity, and to afford to us reasonable hopes of an ultimate and happy deliverance from all our dangers and afflictions: 

-- Opening Paragraph Proclamation 118, Abraham Lincoln, October 20, 1864

America is a Nation of promise and possibilities — and that is because, every day, ordinary Americans are doing extraordinary things.  Our service members and veterans have given all, risked all, and dared all to keep our Nation free.  Our first responders, firefighters, and police officers risk their lives every day to keep the rest of us safe.  I can see the best of America in them and in our workers and union leaders, public servants and teachers, doctors and scientists, and all who give their heart and soul to ensuring people are treated with dignity and respect.  And I find hope in our Nation’s families, who sacrifice so much to achieve the American Dream and build a future worthy of our highest aspirations.
     This Thanksgiving — the last one I will declare as President — I express my gratitude to the American people.  Serving as President has been the honor of a lifetime.  America is the greatest country on Earth, and there is so much to be grateful for.  May we celebrate all that unites us — because there is nothing beyond our capacity if we do it together.

-- Excerpt from A Proclamation on Thanksgiving Day 2024, Joseph R. Biden Jr, November 27, 2024

-- Bob Doan, Odenton, MD