Ah, the week before Thanksgiving. This is the week where parents start freaking out over cleaning the house for guests, you spend money on food that you're going to be eating for the next two weeks, you pull out the Christmas decorations from under the house and hide them in the garage for the day after this turkey holiday, and you begin to pick out things you want from Walmart because it's marked down by 75 percent. Back in 1621, the first Thanksgiving wasn't about quickly eating dinner, going over what we're thankful for, then racing each other to a $2 bed sheet. Back then they had to worry about disease, famine and things higher up the food chain. Today we've commercialized Thanksgiving into a holiday where we say one thing then do another the same night. I've worked at a Walmart for two years, and though the Thanksgiving nights are high energy and a lot of fun, especially when you're a cashier (no sarcasm intended), you begin to wonder: "If you're truly thankful for what you have, why are you fighting an elderly woman for a television?"

Today I'm looking at the Black Friday deals from big names like Target, Walmart, Kohl's and Best Buy, and though I want that Xbox One so badly (because I have to upgrade from my 360 to play the new "Assassin's Creed"), I look inwardly to myself and, even though it's not Thanksgiving yet, I begin to see that I'm grateful for the things I already have. For example, my parents are helping me pay for my expensive college education (they're not paying for it all, I have helped with that, too), my education in general, this great experience to live in a city instead of a small farm town that I used to live in, being a military dependent and still being allowed to stay on Tricare. Those things affect me every day, and I am so blessed to be able to have access to these things when people in certain countries don't have access to clean water. Today I filled up my water bottle from a Brita Water Spout Filter while someone from a tribe in Africa probably just pulled their water from a dirty river. I am thankful for everything I have today, and I don't feel the need to go out and buy things for people at a discounted price to make them like me more.

Here in America, we worry more about what we are going to get Thursday night then what we're truly thankful for. If you go and participate in Black Friday, how are you thankful for what you already have? These big name stores have commercialized this thankful day into a day where you contradict what you say hours before. People should be thankful for the life they get to live every day, the breath that they breathe every day, the beating of their hearts. In light of the recent attacks on Paris and in Libya, we should not only be looking to ourselves but to other countries in crisis. If you really want to spend money, sent it to countries that are in need of it right now. While we are so worried about spending hours in line for a 20" Vizio TV, people over in Libya are dying from car bomb explosions and people in Paris are fearful of another terrorist attack.

So as you sit down at the Thanksgiving table this year think about these things:

1. What do you have that you could never live without?

2. If it was taken away how would you feel?

3. Does it have a price on it?

4. Are you grateful for it?

5. Are you truly grateful for it?

6. When you go and shop the sales that night, are you contradicting what you said earlier that night?

7. If yes, how can you feel grateful now?

These are the questions I will be asking myself this year.

I, Becca Jo Rysewyk, am grateful for my family, my small group of friends, the roof over my head, my education here at Queens University, the breath in my lungs and the pep in my step. I am grateful for my cat, Apollo, the ability to go home to see my mom on certain weekends, for the baby my sister is going to have in December and her stepson, the clothes I wear and the semi-healthy body I have. I am grateful for all these things and I wouldn't change or give away any of this because these are the things that I cannot live without.

So I will take a pledge, that if I should participate in the sales going on Thursday night, I will not forget the things that I have that I cannot live without because they are near and dear to my heart. I pledge to remember the things I am grateful for and know that without these things I couldn't have made it through this previous year, without these things I couldn't be me. I pledge to be truly thankful this Thanksgiving and not let these big name stores commercialize me. I, Becca Jo Rysewyk, pledge to celebrate Thanksgiving with a grateful mind and a heart full of peace and love.

Have a happy Thanksgiving, everyone.