Canadian Thanksgiving: Why We Don't Do it the "Normal" Way

So, tomorrow is Canadian Thanksgiving. It's ridiculously early by American standards. Being mostly submersed in American culture as a kid, I used to wonder why we didn't have it in November like the "normal" people down south did. I had several theories: maybe British thanksgiving was in October*, maybe the Natives and the Pilgrims shared meals in Canada first, maybe we were just weird that way.

Now that I'm older, though, Canadian thanksgiving makes a lot of sense. As it turns out, in Canada, Mid-October is a much more suitable time for the holiday than Late November. All of the major elements of this tradtion just work better on the Canadian date (at least for us Canadians).

Foliage:

There's a saying in Canada: "We have two seasons, eh: Winner an' waitin' for Winner." Fall, while not completely non-existant, is extremely short. If we want to frolic in falling leaves, or more to the point, give them to our children to glue on to centerpeices for the kitchen table, we have to do it FAST.

And really, you tell me: which one looks more like Thanksgiving?

Turkey Dinner Satisfaction Ratio:

As you can see from the above diagram, the progression of American statuory holidays (pictured in blue), includes and extended "dry period" at the beggining of the season where turkey dinner satisfaction is at its lowest, due to a lack of turkey dinners, followed by an elongated high period between American Thanksgiving and Christmas. The Canadian progression (pictured in red), follows a more balanced trajectory, with some degree of turky satisfaction throughout the season. 

Giving Thanks:

As sad a commentary as it is, most people don't feel particularly grateful when it's minus forty and we're contending with 7 hours of sunlight or less a day. In Canada, that's most of the time, November 24th included most years.

Which scene makes you feel better about life?

Black Friday: Yeah...we don't do that in Canada. We have Boxing Day on December 26 instead.


See?!?, it's just better, as far as us Canadians are concerned.**

*As it turns out, Canadian Thanksgiving corresponds with the Harvest Festival in Europe, so this childhood assumption wasn't completely wrong. Yay me!
** DISCLAIMER: the contents of this article are intended for humor purposes only. Any offence taken is unintentional and extremely unfortunate.

Turkey and Stuff... (ing)

Because I live in Canada, yesterday was officially thanksgiving. However, my family always likes to celebrate it the day before in order to give everyone a chance to rest up before heading back to work. So, true to tradition, we all loaded up the family sedans and drove out to Edmonton to eat thanksgiving dinner together. Of course, our family get togethers are always wonderfully chaotic due to the general inability of all involved to speak to one another quietly, add to that a few kids under ten, and how could they not be? As in any family, kids always have the funniest things to say, but my little cousin Lucas (5) takes the cake for deciding that his nickname is from now on is Freddie Benson (yes, he even made up a last name). When asked where he got such a name, he replied, in the most matter-of-fact little kid voice I've ever heard "from Calgary." I couldn't stop laughing. Even cuter was when he and his brother Cody decided to "play pacman" (which was basically like tag except that the ghost was "it" and they would switch roles when Pac-Man ate a power pill). Anyway, it was an amazing evening with some amazing people. I had a great time!