In unison across the nation, on this day, we gather at tables in the homes of relatives or perhaps in restaurants to feast, to laugh, to reconnect, to reminisce.

Some live with abundance every day while others struggle to feed a family, a child or themselves. Nevertheless, regardless of our circumstances, we arrive wide-eyed at the well-garnished table, because today the meal is seasoned with love and gratitude; not that our every day meals are any less worthy of recognition. Perhaps this meal is the culmination of all others.

Life and society bring normal, inevitable and sometimes gigantic challenges. We watch and react. It is human nature. We assess and criticize. We criticize those who criticize, not remembering that at every turn of history and innovation it is this critical eye that leads thinkers, inventors, leaders, parents and even children to this thought: “We can do better.” Why, even animals come to this conclusion with their own circumstances.

So we invent machines intended to improve the processes that help us communicate, travel and procure shelter and food and then we look at those machines and say, “We are polluting. This is bad.” But it is not, because in the instant we have that thought, someone is already at the drawing table, thinking up a better way. Perfection is a process.

We can do everything by hand to save energy, and there is nothing wrong with that for each one has their own style, or we can use blenders and juicers and strainers and grinders. These change everything. They change how we make food and what we do with the day before and after we make food. They even change our creative impulses, which in turn brings us joy. There is so much value in that.

The crop that did not succeed out in the open turns to great and manageable abundance within the shelter of a greenhouse or a cold frame. Go figure. The single person on limited income can find joy, even a sense of great abundance, in the harvest on their front stoop thanks to a cleverly designed square-foot growing kit.

All of these things exist because someone, somewhere asked, “How can we make this better?” Someone, somewhere, benefits. Always. And the moments of glory we experience because we had the right tools, or even the right things in general, inspire who we are with ourselves and with others. For some, it is their bare hands; for others, an elaborate workshop. The painter needs a paint brush and the singer needs a voice. We gather the things that work best for us.

And there are the bigger things we bring into our lives. Big cars and patio furniture and impressive lawn swings where the grand-parents sit all evening with the children when perhaps a regular chair might do. But sitting with the children is about atmosphere and the swinging inspires a song or a story they will remember their entire lives. In fact, years later you realize that this very swing is the seat of their deepest values. That is something to be thankful for.

Then we invent or continue traditions absent-mindedly, probably because indeed, tradition must flow like the blood in our veins, without a second thought. “It is just another commercial holiday,” we may think at some point, questioning the practice. Who cares. If it is a reason to gather and rejoice and take stock and be thankful, so be it.

Like the table that offers a wild and vast garden of color and nourishment, Thanksgiving broadens the horizon of our perception so that on this day, we are thankful for what we have, who we are, where we’re going, and the greater picture that somehow led to this moment in spite of unimaginable mistakes and obstacles. Even in those times in life when we are down to nearly nothing, all of us catch ourselves smiling at some point, as if it all did not matter; or as if it did.

In the end, what matters is that we uplift each other, somehow.