Friendsgiving
The evolution of a holiday tradition
When my sweetheart, Robert, and I moved to Florida from NYC back in 2020, it had not dawned on me at the time that we might need to reimagine some of our beloved traditions. One of those is Thanksgiving, which has been my second favorite holiday (after Independence Day). You see, no one from either of our families lives in Florida.
While I love cooking daily for the two of us, I was suddenly bereft at the thought of not experiencing the bustle of family seated around a big table heavily laden with food. What were we to do?
Enter a lovely suggestion from a couple of our friends who live not far from us in Orlando. “What about celebrating Friendsgiving with us?” they queried.
“Friendsgiving? What’s that??” I asked, with my Sheldon-like tendency to resist change.
It’s as simple and as wonderful as a group of friends (rather than relatives) getting together to eat and give thanks for the bounty and goodwill that we share. When I looked into this relatively recent alternative tradition, even though the term “Friendsgiving” had not been used until around 2007, I was delighted to see mention of 1973’s A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving as a model for it.
We’ve recently celebrated our fifth Friendsgiving with various groups of friends of ours who live in different Florida cities. It’s always a joyous occasion and such fun to plan, as we each bring something to the occasion. One of my non-food contributions is a toast: “To friendship, flourishing, and freedom in Florida!”
This year, I’m especially grateful for having a growing circle of friends in Florida, most of whom are fellow New York transplants. I’m thankful to this year’s hostess who cooked up a storm and invited us into her home. All she wanted us to bring were our appetites, good cheer, and stories of what we each have been up to this year.
I’ve come to look forward to and love Friendsgiving, but I’m also grateful that each December we fly up to New York to spend the holidays with our beloved families. One foot in the old and one in the new is a good place to stand.
You can suppose that I have to reimagine some of my beloved traditions living in Korea. But part of what helped me bring most of my authentic Christmas here was insisting Hyeyeon and I go back to Canada the very first Christmas of our marriage. In 2009, we were married in my parents' backyard in July before going back to Korea (a rushed affair that we decided on a week before we were to go home and which was lauded by all 50 or so who attended in polos and other less than formalwear as one of the best weddings ever. We then had a more formal and huge invite-everyone-you-ever-met-in-your-life Korean wedding that October.) You can guess that for a young couple with no money, flights to Canada plus six weeks of living holiday-style in that expensive place left us in a hole, albeit worth it. Nonetheless, I said, "If you're gonna be my wife, you must understand Christmas." I explained how the mood of goodwill and general delight surrounding Christmas is incommunicable and must be experienced. And because it is so important to me (it is my holiday of appreciation moreso than Thanksgiving), just kind of supporting me in celebrating the season while not fully getting it was intolerable. Well, we went back that December 2009, and she has become almost as big an "Elf" as I am.
We just did our cermonial tree decorating last night. We took the Sunday to do most of the house and the foundations of the tree, but yesterday was Dec. 1 (I simply can't get into it with a November on the board), and we took over an hour to put up all the special ornaments we've collected from trips, events, and gifts from students and other friends over the years, remembering them all as we put each up. Christmas is fully on in this house! And I share it with a Korean woman who really knows what it's all about.
I also just finished my annual Fall semester Christmas unit, sharing the meaning and traditions with my students, inviting them to adopt more of it into their own lives and their future families. Santa Claus, material beauty, overindulgence, goodwill, appreciation, and keen enjoyment of life are not the exclusive province of any culture or religion, but are universal values that anyone can make their own. Korea does it superficially, with Starbucks having the music and seasonal drinks, department stores done up and other smaller shops trying to have a few token decorations and lights, which is fine. But no one gets it. No one can get it.
We'll be having our annual Christmas party in a few weeks, where foreigners come to feel some of home (which is the goal of it and which enhances my own normalcy), and some Korean friends get to experience something that has nothing close to an equal in any Korean tradition.
I have been promoting this thing over a couple decades in this country. But whether anyone else takes it up, I have it here with me. Thanks to Hyeyeon.
Happy Friendsgiving, Carrie-Ann, to you and Robert. And Merry Christmas!
I've participated in this for such a long time that I forgot it wasn't the traditional way to experience Thanksgiving. (I suspect that Friendsgivings thrive in L.A., because, like Florida, it's a common destination for transplants.)