It's Turkey Day, AKA Thanksgiving Day, AKA National Day of Mourning.

We've spent Tuesday and most of Wednesday traveling. Tuesday was a 5 hour plane ride, and I catnapped throughout most of it, abandoning my ambitious plan to continue reading Zinn. Today, however, was a pleasant, 3 hour train ride, and I was able to catch up on some articles and a podcast episode (okay, to be honest, I did listen to a podcast on the plane, but I also fell asleep during it 🙄).

On another note, I have discovered a rather painful way to fix mild jet lag. For a flight that jumps ahead two time zones, I need to:

1. Sleep little or not at all the night before, continuing a pattern of sleep-deprivation from the week prior.
2. Eat hardly anything all day.
3. Get on an early-ish flight.
4. Land at destination in time to have an early dinner
5. Fight a burgeoning headache until an acceptable early bedtime (in my case it was 8 p.m.).
6. Wake up after 5 hours of sleep, take diphenhydramine (I took it on an empty stomach; do not recommend), and fall back asleep after playing solitaire for an hour.
7. Wake up at a semi-reasonable hour for the time zone I'm in.
8. Feel okay-ish for the rest of the day.

Back to business. In this week's digest, I'm including all the articles I read yesterday related to Thanksgiving Day origins and myths, with short explanations. I hope they are helpful.

This piece and the following piece by the Smithsonian cover the new book called This Land Is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving. This article by The New Yorker is an overview: "The Invention of Thanksgiving".

(for reference: King Philip's War)

(for reference: Manifest Destiny)

This article is an interview with the author of the book named above: "The Myths of the Thanksgiving Story and the Lasting Damage They Imbue".

This article is written by a Native American on how she chooses to celebrate T. Day. Perhaps we would do well to honor Native Americans with our celebrations: "The Thanksgiving Tale We Tell Is a Harmful Lie. As a Native American, I’ve Found a Better Way to Celebrate the Holiday".

This article has a slightly different perspective than the one above, as reflected in the title: "National Day of Mourning Reflects on Thanksgiving’s Horrific, Bloody History".