Hello, friends! This week I'm cheating and combining two posts into one. Here are the resources I've been most grateful for this week (ordered from most to least serious).

Mostly, though, I'm grateful for all of YOU, who are reading and texting and thinking with me about finding wholeness and working for justice. I hope your own Thanksgiving tables are abundant in love and welcome and a whole lot of grace! Here we go...

If you're struggling to balance "the grief and the gratitude"

Potawatomi author Kaitlin Curtice calls out the power of ritual to help create wholeness in a season of brazen extremes:

Hold grief rituals for a heavy world and a heavy heart: it’s important to hold space for grief during the holidays. For those who have lost loved ones, it’s a time to manage the joy and the pain, to lean into the nostalgia while also dealing with reality. Take time for grief. Mourn for a world that is hurting and broken, where war and genocide still exist. Light a candle daily, noticing the grief and the gratitude that often coincide.

(And send money to groups providing direct care for the people who need it most!)

If you need guidance on Gaza/Israel

Without expecting to form perfectly educated and nuanced opinions on it, I've been appreciating anything that helps me better understand the dire situation in Israel and Gaza. I've found Ezra Klein's takes characteristically helpful (most especially November 17's breathtaking episode), and comedy writer Bess Kalb (subscribe to her newsletter!) has also been great to read. This piece is oddly clarifying.

Transition!

Also from Bess Kalb: If My Son Wrote Leviticus. Just fantastic.

If you cannot do any more meal planning

My children are both contrarians, and there are literally like three recipes where their preferences overlap. This was an instant hit with everyone at the table. If you eat meat, don't think; just put this on the docket for next week.

If you only like your fauna funny

The Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards' finalists are out (see above and below). Check them all out, vote for your favorite, and take a look at the archive of past winners, incl a salty turtle.

Love you! Happy Thanksgiving! xoxo