Thanksgiving means being surrounded by my family and devouring delicious food until I am completely stuffed. But no matter how you chose to celebrate Thanksgiving, by the time Thanksgiving Day actually rolls around, you likely already celebrated a Friendsgiving or two — maybe, even, you’re still celebrating it.
Friendsgiving is an increasingly popular trend these days and is a wonderful way to share your favorite parts of the Thanksgiving meal with your friends. As humans, we bond with others over food. Having a Friendsgiving dinner not only allows us to share our traditions with our friends, but also strengthens those friendships as we spend time enjoying a meal together. Friendsgiving is also fantastic because you get to eat some really good food.
Most Friendsgiving dinners are structured around what we’ve come to know as the “traditional” Thanksgiving meal — turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, green beans, sweet potato casserole, rolls, pumpkin pie and so on. However, since the Thanksgiving meal looks different for different people and families, your Friendsgiving might look — and taste — different as well. Part of the beauty of Friendsgiving is that everyone brings a different dish to the meal. It could be a secret family recipe passed down through generations or even just a good, old classic picked up from the local Wegmans and heated up in the microwave — we’ll still eat it.
This year, my housemates and I had a Friendsgiving dinner together. None of us wanted to attempt cooking a turkey, so we picked up some rotisserie chicken instead. We each made our favorite side dish and then piled our plates with stuffing, roasted veggies, ham biscuits, macaroni and cheese and pumpkin cheesecake.
For me and my housemates, our Friendsgiving was a genuinely lovely evening. We lit some candles and enjoyed our delicious feast while catching up with one another. In the spirit of the Thanksgiving season, we also shared some of the things we are grateful for.
In the midst of the stress of school, work and life that we are continually surrounded by as students, it was nice to take a moment to relax and reflect on all of the things we have to be thankful for. I often take for granted simple things like the fact that I have the opportunity to study and learn at such a prestigious university, that I have a place to live, that I have food to eat and that I have friends who care about me.
While the Thanksgiving season can be a fun time filled with good food and special traditions, it is, first and foremost, a time to reflect on our lives and remember gratitude. I am truly grateful that I was able to share a Friendsgiving with my housemates because it was an evening that we were all excited about and could bond over. I am also grateful that we were able to talk about some of the things we are grateful for because that brings you closer than good food ever can.
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