Happy International Thanksgiving!

It has been a long, long time since I've written. I will fill you in later as to why, but for now I'll just say I have been working a lot.

This weekend, however...Thanksgiving! Not that you can tell around here. There is some Christmas stuff for sale in the stores, but Thanksgiving is obviously not a big deal in a country that is not the United States.

This was a regular work week, but since there is not any Thanksgiving advertising I didn't really feel the holiday until I saw so many friends holiday-ing with family on Facebook.

About a week ago I realized that this could be my one opportunity to see the entire Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade! Every year I intend to get up in time to see it, which means 9 a.m. And every year I sleep in so long I barely see Santa at the end. My plan for Thursday after work was set: watch the Macy's Parade at 6 p.m. local time. I invited a couple of friends to join me.

Then on Friday we decided to have a Thanksgiving potluck in a park in Abu Dhabi.

Thursday

On the elevator up to the mall. "We'll only be an hour or so..."

Thursday didn't go exactly as planned. The ladies came over but the only website I found to stream from was the Dallas NBC affiliate in the Central Time Zone and so we had an extra hour than I originally thought. So we decided to take a quick trip to the mall to pick up some things for the potluck on Friday. I was sure we'd be back for a good two hours of the parade.

Three hours later....after the make up store, Lush, the supermarket and dinner.

When I got home, I talked to most of the family, as I would on any Thanksgiving day. Thanks to Skype I felt even closer to them. Then I slept for 8 hours!!! Amazing!

Friday

Today, which I consider to be the actually Thanksgiving Day since I didn't have to work, I started with a visit to the pool with a friend at her building's pool. How wonderful to be sitting in the sun by a pool instead of in the sun on the deck of a ski lodge! I miss skiing, but I am really enjoying being warm.

Our potluck was a huge success! There were only 3 Americans out of the dozen participants. One guy is also from Texas and we bored the others silly with our tales of American football on Thanksgiving Day and the litany of country and western songs we both enjoyed [FYI: Amarillo by Morning tops the list].

We chipped in for a turkey, dressing, veggies and potatoes. Everyone brought something and we met up in a park in Abu Dhabi. This is not small feat here during November. The weather is absolutely fantastic and everyone comes out at night. Every park if jammed full of people sitting in their camp chairs with tables of food around, just enjoying the weather and each other's company. I cannot emphasize enough how many people are out at night here. Everywhere. 

Luckily the park was not super crowded and we set up camp in a lovely spot. We ate, talked, kicked a soccer [I will NOT call it a football] ball around, walked to the Starbucks and back, laughed and took turns saying what we are grateful for. 

It was an absolutely fantastic Thanksgiving. These people are my family here, and I couldn't have asked for a better group. 

The striking thing about the whole week to me is this, however: I did not feel lonely at all this week. I miss my family, but loneliness isn't in me. I can remember the last few Thanksgivings I stayed in Boise instead of going to Texas and feeling absolutely vacant inside, even though I was in a town full of friends. Here, on the other side of the world with only people I have known for 3 months, I feel totally full of joy and love. It must be a change in me that is the difference. It must not be about how many people are around or how many people I know or friends I have, but my willingness to open my heart to them.

My #1 gratitude today is that I moved to Abu Dhabi. 

My heart is finally opening.