Friends,
Hello and welcome to Unpacking. Let’s get right into what many are talking about—Thanksgiving and COVID.
American Thanksgiving has a violent history. In the present day, if you’re lucky, it is pleasant and gluttonous. This year, if you’re even luckier, it is pleasant, gluttonous, and COVID-free. And if you’re one of the luckiest people in the entire country, the COVID-free piece will be something that you can control.
Today’s leadership vacuum, strained healthcare system, and the distinctly American myopia about individual “freedom” have led to a national plan of attack we can call: “Personal Comfort Levels.” (As in: if you are “personally comfortable” getting on a plane, flying across the country and joining pods with Grandma, and Grandma is comfortable with that too, then it seems some in our society are saying—go right ahead).
We’re not totally sure how we got here, but sometimes it is comforting to remember that science is science, and your family member who might be pressuring you to make an unsafe trip is, in fact, in the wrong. So without further ado, here’s a helpful starter kit for your safe holiday:
For Thanksgiving Day, Zoom will lift its 40-minute time limit for free meetings
34 Best Thanksgiving Movies - Here Are All the Thanksgiving Movies to Watch This Year
What we’re doing for Thanksgiving
Emily: We (my husband, dog and I) are staying local and cooking a vegetarian feast for two, likely: mashed potatoes, stuffing (maybe this recipe, with veggie broth instead?), sweet potatoes with marshmallows obviously, and an autumnal pasta dish like probably this butternut squash and spinach lasagna. Yes, I’m treating Thanksgiving as an extravagant meal prep day.
Carrie: We too are staying put for Thanksgiving, having cancelled plans to visit family in Chicago. Those recent Zoom calls with family to rethink the holidays were almost too much for my heart. And yet, comfort food springs eternal. Current plans are afoot to cherry-pick dishes from one of our all-time favorite restaurants, Mamaleh’s in Cambridge, Mass., to make at home. Chocolate tahini pie, check.
Water cooler convo
Emily: I am feeling some anxiety around the continued …. delay (let’s call it that) around T****’s concession. Two weeks ago, only hilarity. Now, the whole thing is still ridiculous, but increasingly terrifying to see how some people buy into it. Is this the most widely-adopted American conspiracy theory of all time?!
Carrie: This reminds me of an Axios write-up that resonated with me: Blunt 2020 lessons for media, America. In particular: “Twitter is a mass-reality-distortion field for liberals and reporters. The group-think and liberal high-fiving was as bad as ever and continues to be a massive trap and distraction for journalists.”
Emily: The Crown and The Queen’s Gambit—I am done with the former, about to start the latter. I’m very excited for this weekend when I will sit down and read all the explainers and fact-checks on The Crown. WHY DO I FIND THE ROYAL FAMILY SO FASCINATING? It feels like a fun drama because 1) culturally, I can relate to the stodginess and weirdness around emotion having grown up in the Puritan-land of Massachusetts and yet, 2) the royal family doesn’t really affect me. It’s kind of like the fascination I have Facebook creeping on my second cousins in Montana.
Carrie: Lol. To be honest, I’m not aiming to watch either! I think I need a break from the drama. Right now, my big thing is enjoying the curbside pick-up from the local public library. It works so well, and it makes my heart so happy to have an overabundance of books around. Speaking of which, maybe we do a book recommendation segment for this newsletter?
Responses from our readers
We are thrilled to announce that this newsletter is getting some serious traction (!) in the audience response realm! Check out this comment from Megan, a self-described lifelong Bostonian, about last week’s grammar download:
“I hate ‘Boston Strong’!!! It was used as a way to market the city and sell shit on the back of a tragedy and it drove me flipping nuts. Also I feel like it's the opposite of ‘injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere’- we should always care about violence, which mostly happens in our city in under-resourced neighborhoods, not via terrorist attacks. But that connection & the idea of preventing violence in our city was not connected to the slogan.”
You too can join in the conversation! Shoot us a note at newsletterwizards@gmail.com or respond directly to this email.
And a heads up, since we both read Anne Helen Peterson’s burnout generation piece, we will not be publishing an edition of Unpacking next week. Hope you all get a moment of calm, and thanks for reading.
Your newslettering pals,
Emily & Carrie