My 7 Happy Valley Reasons to Give Thanks

Thanksgiving has always been a joyful holiday for me, whether I was living in California, Maryland or Texas. But having returned to my hometown after an absence of 39 years, I can honestly say there’s no better perch for celebrating Thanksgiving than right here in State College.

Perhaps you’ve grown numb to the joys of a Happy Valley holiday. If so, I’d like to share a few special reasons for enjoying Thanksgiving in our little community.

1. Football is fun again!

Something tells me the Pilgrims wouldn’t have wanted me to start out with gridiron-related gratitude. But ever since 1934, when the Detroit Lions first staged an NFL game on this holiday, football has played a major role in Thanksgiving celebrations. Here in Happy Valley, we have a special opportunity to appreciate our college football team since we have not been spoiled like those folks in Columbus or Tuscaloosa.

So, thank you, Nittany Lion footballers, for your hard work on the practice field and for your perseverance despite a rash of injuries to linebackers and then to offensive linemen. It’s nice to be reminded of the good ol’ days in the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s when our team often stood among the nation’s the top 10, our coach was frequently a candidate for Coach of the Year honors and our top star was being mentioned for the Heisman Trophy.

And while we’re remembering bygone traditions, here’s a wish for the Lions to return to dominance over Michigan State. Penn State began Big 10 play in 1993, and from that year through 2010, our Nittany Lions achieved a record of 13-5 against Sparty.

2. State College is a great place to spend Thanksgiving.

If Thanksgiving is best observed as a quiet time with family, there’s nowhere much quieter than State College after the students have gone home. I love this town when Penn State students are here, but I also like the change-of-pace when they go home and all of us townies get some solitude.

But I do have one complaint about Thanksgiving in State College. Why in the world do we light our downtown Christmas tree, display our holiday decorations and welcome Santa Claus on Nov. 17 — a week before Thanksgiving? We’ve only got one major holiday that hasn’t been commercialized, and that’s Thanksgiving. So now we’re allowing the commercialization of Christmas to intrude on the simple quiet of Thanksgiving? Call me Ebenezer Scrooge if you want, but I prefer to celebrate Thanksgiving in November and Christmas in December.

3. We are blessed by the presence of nearly 9,000 international students.

What does the international community have to do with an ‘American’ holiday like Thanksgiving? Glad you asked. Last time I checked, Thanksgiving was an expression of thanks to God that was celebrated in a three-day feast shared by the English ‘Pilgrims’ and the Patuxent tribe of Native Americans. So here we are in State College, and I am very, very thankful to see the cornucopia of cultures in a place that would otherwise be too ‘vanilla.’ We had no such mixture of cultures when I left this town in 1974, but when I returned in 2013, I saw thousands of brilliant students from some 130 nations. Yes, I’m thankful for their presence here, and I must say it was a thrill for Kathy and I to host 18 of them for an early Thanksgiving dinner last Friday.

4. We can still remember the beauty of this fall.

Or at least we might choose to remember the gorgeous leaves we observed just a few weeks ago. I hope you noticed that it was a great season for foliage in central Pennsylvania’s mountains and even in our community and across our campus. But all of that ended several weeks ago, and it’s easy to forget the blessings of yesterday while focusing on today’s burdens. I’ve decided that I don’t need to focus solely on the gray of November if I can simply close my eyes and picture the yellows, oranges and reds of October. Having lived seven years in California and seven years in Texas — both ‘no fall’ states — I’m grateful for the vivid colors in my memory.

5. Our location is attractive to holiday visitors.

Whether now single or married, whether now surrounded by little ones or not, virtually all of us can remember the joy of gathering around a happy Thanksgiving table. It’s a Norman Rockwell fantasy that becomes a reality — until someone decides to discuss politics.

Here in Happy Valley, there is the special opportunity to host family or friends for Thanksgiving and for the Michigan State game. That is to say, if those folks can get here. Obviously, State College is not the most accessible destination for travelers. But I remember the way it was in the old days, so I’m adding I-80 and I-99 to my list of reasons for thanks.

6. This website opens doors to friendship.

To me, words are just words unless they lead to meaningful actions or relationships. So I’m grateful to have the opportunity to share my thoughts with you twice a month and then to enjoy some friendships that result. Yes, it’s been an awesome privilege to renew acquaintances with the subjects of my columns, folks like Jim Houck, interim dean of Penn State Law; Phil Keeney, retired Creamery icon; and Mike Archer, former head football coach at LSU. I’ve also been blessed by new friendships with statecollege.com managing editor Geoff Rushton and my fellow columnists Mike Poorman and Joe Battista. And I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the resulting Facebook connections with old classmates (State High ’70 and PSU ’74) and many new friends. I really am grateful, and there’s no better time than this holiday to express it.

7. Best of all, we can apply lessons from the Pilgrims.

Okay, so the Pilgrims landed in America in 1620, nearly 400 years ago, and they settled in Plymouth, Mass., some 475 miles north of State College. We certainly have less claim to their heritage than those who were closer chronologically or geographically. As best I know, they weren’t known to yell, ‘We are…’ But there’s no doubt in my mind that our Happy Valley would be even happier with a large dose of the faith that sustained these folks. Consider that of the original 102 Mayflower passengers, only 47 survived until the spring of 1621, and half of the ship’s crew also died. Grief-stricken as they must have been, those hearty souls still thanked God for the miracles that had enabled their survival — including the presence of an English-speaking Native American who taught them local techniques for farming and fishing.

And so it was that the Pilgrims scheduled the first Thanksgiving feast in the fall of 1621. They were so grateful, it seems, that these English settlers and their Native American friends needed three days to fully celebrate their bounty. As Edward Winslow wrote in a letter to relatives in England, ‘And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.’