I think Thanksgiving is mostly about belonging.

I was raised in a culture other than that of either of my parents or my nationality: what they call a Third Culture Kid. With that sort of profile, belonging is hard to come by. As a child, I sounded British but wasn’t; I didn’t get the overt cultural references and didn’t share the unspoken common understandings that mark someone out as being from the same tribe. I was indelibly other, and felt it, and knew it.

I’m thankful for my family for providing that sense of belonging: a space in my life that felt safe and was rich with those shared understandings. In the same way that some people are proud of the region they’re from or their religion or some other demarcation of sameness, I’m endlessly proud of my mother, my father, my sister, who each of them were and are as people, and who we all have been together. It’s not perfect or spotless — I’ve sometimes disappointed them in all sorts of ways, both small and catastrophic — but it’s ours. I’m lucky. Not everyone has that sense of belonging; that safety. A feeling of home, not from a place or things or nationality, but from people.

I used to throw Thanksgiving dinners when I lived in Edinburgh. I think people were grateful for the meal, if a bit nonplussed about why I was holding such a big dinner party on a Thursday. I found a sense of temporary community there, over homemade tortillas sprawled over the kitchen table of our top-floor tenement flat, but never quite belonging.

In my life, I’ve rarely been able to recreate that sense of belonging outside of our unit, and my aunts, uncles, and cousins. I’ve learned that I mostly find a shared sense of belonging with people who also share some degree of outsiderness, whose identities don’t quite fit into cookie-cutter homogeneity.

These days, of course, I have a new belonging: to a tiny child for whom I’m safety, who curls up into my arms and sleeps, who I put food on the table for, and who comes to me for kisses when he’s hurt or feeling sad. I see my new role as extending my family forward, and helping to give him all the warmth, safety, and, yes, non-conformity I got from mine.

Thanksgiving, then, for me, is about families, whether born or adoptive or found, and gratitude for the people who create safety and warmth. I’m thankful for mine: the one I’m linked to by blood, and the people who I’ve been lucky enough to call home, some of whom are overlapping.

This Thanksgiving I’m also thankful for the people who create that sense of belonging in the world: who seek to create bonds and build community, to try and forge belonging for everyone, rather than withdraw and isolate.

I’m thankful for the people who have to work so hard just to be themselves, to fight for their own identities, and for the people who see them as they are, not through the lens of outdated societal norms or inherited expectations. I’m thankful for people who want to include, and see inclusivity as a guiding value, not as a pejorative.

I’m thankful for the people who see suffering in places like Gaza and think, how can everyone belong and be safe, and not, these people had it coming, or this has nothing to do with me. I’m thankful for the people who see war and want it to end, not silently, but with their voices, on the streets.

I’m thankful for people who see the suffering of working people and choose to stand up for their rights and their well-being; for unions, for higher minimum wages, for protections, for laws and movements that give everybody a voice and a good life. I’m thankful for people who think, how can we improve and build a good life for everybody?

I’m thankful for the people who see every religion (and no religion) equally, and who push to ensure everybody has an equitable place.

I’m thankful for the people who see generational inequalities and want to right them, to halt cycles of harm so that future generations do not have to endure them.

I’m thankful for the people who see and act as if the world is one connected place, where every single person matters, regardless of where they are, what their background is, who they worship, or what their political leaders believe.

This Thanksgiving, I hold gratitude not only for my family and the belonging they’ve given me but also for those who strive to build a world where everyone can feel at home.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you. I hope you have belonging, and love, warmth, and safety.