This will be my eighth Thanksgiving away from the USA; Jenn’s as well.

We both moved to Cayman in 2006, and don’t think (!) we ever went back “home” for Thanksgiving once we got there.

We’ve always missed our families, albeit in different ways.  I’ve had a few chances to call and Skype during the family meal, but Jenn has worked in a British school system for the last few years where the holiday is not observed, so she’s missed out on those chats during her family’s meal. And my mother has frequently taken a photo of us and placed it on the table for us just like we were there.

This year it’s different.  We’re both having trouble grappling with this holiday this year.  Not that we don’t have a lot to be thankful for, but unfortunately we’ve all too aware of what we’re lacking versus what we have.  Which is not really the point of the holiday; and that makes me feel a little more weird…

Like maybe I should snap out of it and be freakin’ happy to be alive and healthy and have a wonderful wife and dog and cat and roof over my head and warm clothes to wear and food to eat… and that there are people out there who don’t have any of that.

But… it’s all relative.  And the fact is that I don’t think we’ve ever felt more alone for Thanksgiving then we do this year.

Away from the family home is one thing…  away from family itself is another… and away from the people who were our adopted family is just plain brutal.

We’re going to a brewpub for Thanksgiving this year.  I’m sure it’ll be nice, but it won’t be Copper Falls in Cayman for the third year with friends we’ve had for over four years, and it won’t be our place in Mystic Retreat where we hosted American Thanksgiving the year before that (where I cooked the turkey accidentally upside down), where even though I’d just been ousted from a job, I was surrounded by loved ones… but really, it certainly won’t be home.