Thanksgiving is often symbolized by an overflowing cornucopia, the horn of plenty spilling out bounty too great to be contained.

Giving thanks for that kind of splendor is simple. There is little effort in saying grace at a table that groans under the weight of an impossible feast.

It is also not really what we commemorate on the annual holiday.

The real basis is not a feast that left people too full to move. It was having enough. Enough to celebrate. Enough to get by. Enough to survive in 1621, a year after 45 of the 102 pilgrims at the Plymouth colony died the first winter in the New World.

Today, many people are facing food insecurity. They are pressed by inflation that has puffed the cost of everyday meals steadily. Bread, butter, eggs, ground beef have all risen steadily since the start of the pandemic in 2020. So has the cost of housing, gas, medication and more, making it even harder to pay the increased cost of a normal Thursday night dinner.

That is bad enough. But on a holiday where we often forget about the adequate and focus on the abundance, the deficits stand out all the more.

It isn’t that we cannot enjoy the excess if we have it or indulge in the luxury of choices we might not get on a regular basis. We can and we should — especially as we celebrate after once more surviving when so many were lost.

But we should also remember that the lessons of Thanksgiving are not a pumpkin pie recipe or proper cooking of a turkey. They are gratitude and appreciation — words that don’t just mean “thanks.” They speak of a deep-down recognition that when times are difficult, enough is as good as a feast.

Happy Thanksgiving.

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