I think that when it comes to holidays and their feasts thats one of the times where people lean towards a "body centered" practice. Its because everybody comes together and physically interacts. A big tradition is to feast, a major body-centered practice. When you eat, you are putting food into your body. If you say grace, you hold hands. You attempt to put as much food in your body as possible. You can burn your body or get food poisoning (I agree with the idea that when you are ill you notice your body more often). There are traditions like kissing under the mistletoe which are body-centered. A lot of holiday traditions are body-centered.
For Thanksgiving my family sticks to the tradition of cooking turkey and all the normal sides. My mom gets up early to cook the turkey, we get up late too eat it. Footballs always on all day, except for during the meal. Everyones always talking and socializing, and wondering when the food is going to be ready. Depending on the people at the meal, there's usually a football game. The day is usually food centered, but with other pleasures and traditions not centered around food.
This thanksgiving in particular I noticed the illness and dying taking a part. I looked around the table and realized some of my closest family wasn't there like they usually are. My grandma especially. She's sick and at this point she can't even live without an oxygen tank. It made me sad, because I always enjoy her being around this time. And it was just a little damper on the day. I prayed for her well-being and for her illness to go away. I think it was more that I was having a good time and wanted to share it then anything. But when someone is sick you think about them a lot more. I mean especially when the food was so good and everybody was feeling good illness and dying definitely affected my thanksgiving.
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