Note to reader: I uncovered the following diary entries when snooping around in Special Collections last week. It gives incredibly detailed accounts of an unnamed Puritan settler and Squanto, the famed Native American translator who assisted the Puritans at Plymouth Rock, Mass. in 1621. Both men recalled their experiences at the first Thanksgiving.
Puritan, Nov. 20: O, how I yearn for Merry Olde England! I despise this Plymouth settlement. Our new land is a strange place, rife with filth, pestilence and an atmosphere of malaise. Verily, it is a wretched environ in which to raise a goodly Christian family. I fear I may never escape this drear that pervades this God-forsaken locale.
Also, I tripped on some rocks and skinned my knee yesterday. So that sucks.
But all is not so mirth-deprived. The other day, a kindly local man with befeatheréd hair approached our settlement and presented a bushel of a strange indigenous yellow and green vegetable. We assumed it to be an olive branch, a token of his good nature and good wishes. Naturally, we responded by promptly shooting him and taking the corn. In retrospect, perhaps we needn't have done this.
Squanto, Nov. 20: I fear our relationship with the smelly white men has gotten off on the wrong foot. My cousin was killed while presenting the settlers with a peace offering. Thankfully, though, they have wisely realized our people have lived on this land for thousands of years. Now they understand we might be able to teach them something.
Today, I learned the entirety of their strange language and am thus able to transcribe my thoughts and feelings with perfect grammatical control and ease of the English tongue.
Puritan, Nov. 21: Woe is me, dearest diary! A bout of that feared disease, Jungle Rot, has taken the lives of many members of my kin. My heart aches for their loss -- as well, my heart aches from the debilitating case of Scrofula I have. These are only two of the maladies that have permeated our settlement of recent; others include Grocer's itch, Jaundice, Lockjaw, Milk Leg, Rickets, Scrumpox, Strangery, Deplumation, and Ague. Our medicinal mettle can only carry us so far.
Some of the indigenous folk have graciously offered their services in caring for our sick; they promptly contracted consumption and died soon thereafter.
Yet we have reason to be optimistic -- on the morrow, our two peoples will come together over a shared meal to symbolically symbolize the harmony to be found between our groups.
Squanto, Nov. 22: Tomorrow, we have to cook dinner for the white people. They don't know how to make anything, so we're doing all the heavy lifting here. It's unappreciated. We've given them so much, and what have we gotten in return, other than a slew of ridiculously-named diseases?Zip. Nada. Zilch. I feel like we're seriously getting the short end of the stick over here.
[Editor's note: It's become abundantly clear that Brendan has made this entire thing up. Our apologies.]
Puritan, Nov. 23: Oh, what a glorious day! Today is Thursday, Nov. 23, 1621, a day that will live in history as the date of the first Thanksgiving.
*Cough*
That is, since we're calling this afternoon's event "Thanksgiving," we assume we'll do it every year from now on.
In any case, we Puritans have actually contributed some food for the feast: rat pie, dirt pudding and Scrofula sauce.
Squanto, Nov. 23: The feast was a moderate success, as only 20 of our company died from rat pie-related causes.
Despite all that has transpired during the past few days, I feel we and the Puritan settlers may one day live in peace and prosperity, turning this land into one of racial and ethnic cooperation the likes of which the world has never known.
Puritan, Nov. 24: The rest of the indigenous people died last night after contracting Jungle Rot. Oh well.
Brendan's column runs biweekly Mondays. He can be reached at collins@cavalierdaily.com.
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