Like most holidays, Thanksgiving has evolved over the years to become more of a season than a single day. Case in point: Friendsgiving, or as Merriam-Webster defines it, “a large meal among friends eaten during the Thanksgiving season.” The word itself is, of course, a portmanteau that smashes the words “friend” and “Thanksgiving” together to convey a second (but not necessarily secondary) holiday that's now widely celebrated throughout the U.S.
Since the word first appeared in print in 2007, Friendsgiving has become a staple of the holiday season, with specific menus and how-to guides for hosting and attending a Friendsgiving gathering.
So how did this feast among friends come to be such a social phenomenon? A November 2018 article in The Atlantic points to shifting cultural attitudes toward family and benchmarks of adulthood. As milestones such as getting married or having children have been delayed or skipped altogether, people may be drawn to creating new traditions, and forming close communities beyond blood relatives.
Friendsgiving’s popularity doesn’t seem to be waning anytime soon, and the promise of a good meal with friends as a way to ring in the holiday season feels like reason enough to continue the newfound tradition. Here, we’ve rounded up 12 quotes perfect for celebrating the excitement and the warmth of Friendsgiving festivities.
If you really want to make a friend, go to someone's house and eat with him … the people who give you their food give you their heart.Cesar Chavez
Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.Anaïs Nin
It isn't so much what's on the table that matters, as what's on the chairs.W.S. Gilbert
Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love. Love risks degenerating into obsession, friendship is never anything but sharing.Elie Wiesel
Time doesn’t take away from friendship, nor does separation.Tennessee Williams
A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you.Elbert Hubbard
Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.Marcel Proust
It doesn’t take money to turn off the television and cultivate real bonding time.Marianne Williamson
Friendship … is born at the moment when one man says to another “What! You too? I thought that no one but myself …”C.S. Lewis
The language of friendship is not words but meanings.Henry David Thoreau
Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you; spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life.Amy Poehler
Close friends are truly life’s treasures. Sometimes they know us better than we know ourselves. With gentle honesty, they are there to guide and support us, to share our laughter and our tears. Their presence reminds us that we are never really alone.Vincent Van Gogh
Featured image credit: Renata Apanaviciene/ Shutterstock
