O.C. Re-Creates Spirit of First Thanksgiving

SEAL BEACH —  More than 2,500 miles from Plymouth Rock and 372 years after the first Thanksgiving, two Native American families broke bread in Orange County Thursday with descendants of a couple that came to America on the Mayflower.

Surrounded by the hand-woven baskets, beaded necklaces, burning sage and leather-covered drums that symbolize her friends’ tribal cultures, Lynda Schultz, 55, presided over the “healing celebration” in a rented Pilgrim costume, her blond curls peeking out from under a white bonnet.

“We can’t go back (in time), but let’s mend some of the wounds,” Schultz said as the crowd of about 60 gobbled turkey and trimmings in a clubhouse at Leisure World, the Seal Beach retirement community. “Today’s a start. It’s a small Band-Aid in the world of surgery, but . . . if we take the first step, someone will take another step and another step.”

While most Orange County residents spent the holiday in private celebrations with friends and family, several large groups convened for special Thanksgiving dinners.

In Emerald Bay, 225 friends and relatives of families that lost homes in last month’s devastating firestorm joined together under a tent for the festive meal. And in Santa Ana, nearly 2,000 people feasted on a free meal in a mini-mall parking lot.

A man in a turkey suit waved down passersby in front of Bob’s Burgers on Thursday afternoon, inviting them to stop by for a free plateful of the real bird.

Volunteers from Victory Outreach--a Christian group that ministers to gang members, homeless people and others in the inner-city--filtered through the crowd, reminding guests that they could get seconds (and thirds) inside the restaurant. They even offered free haircuts.

Evangelical ex-gang members, operating from a booth with a large plastic banner saying “God loves the gang member,” roamed the crowds, seeking converts among the scattering of teen-agers who were present.

Single mothers holding toddlers in their laps sat at outdoor tables with homeless elderly women who poked carrots and peas with their forks; young down-and-out couples downed spoonfuls of mashed potatoes while talking with white-bearded men who had bedrolls at their feet.

Others sat alone on vinyl-covered chairs, watching as ex-heroin addicts boomed anti-drug and Christian rap songs on a portable stage.

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“I think this is really nice,” said Raidel Amieva, who has been living on the streets since getting evicted from a single men’s apartment house five months ago. “It brings a lot of people together, and gives them a place to go.”

Amieva, 35, said he walked two miles to get to the event. “I have a lot of friends on the street who have no family--so I told them all to come too,” he said.

Kurt Gallardo, a 26-year-old former cabby staying at the Orange County Rescue Mission in Santa Ana, said the Victory Outreach volunteers are like a “second family.”

“What else could I do today?” asked Gallardo, who grew up in Anaheim.

Newly “homeless” people in Emerald Bay also found sanctuary in each other’s company Saturday, as they milled about a tidy park in the exclusive seaside enclave, many fire victims seeing neighbors for the first time in weeks.

“This will be as good or better a Thanksgiving as we’ve ever had because we truly can focus on what we have to be thankful for,” said Emerald Bay resident Erik Hansen, whose home was among 366 destroyed in the Laguna Beach blaze Oct. 27.

“We’ve got a community spirit that’s stronger than ever,” Hansen, a real estate manager, said as he sipped beer under the bright sun Thursday afternoon. “It’s a gorgeous day and we’ve got an extended family here. It couldn’t be nicer.”

Organized and funded by Emerald Bay residents whose homes escaped the flames, the catered dinner allowed about 25 fire victims to celebrate Thanksgiving with family and friends, some of whom flew in from out of state. About a dozen Emerald Bay firefighters also joined the feast.

During cocktail hour, Graham Kitcher passed around copies of Great Estates magazine, chuckling to friends: “We’re looking at the kind of home we’d really like.” One woman handed out poster prints of Laguna’s breathtaking coastline; another showed off a snapshot of Emerald Bay burning.

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For Johann Jonas, it was the first Thanksgiving in 44 years of marriage that she did not spend behind the stove.

“All my recipes are gone, so I’d have to start all over again,” Jonas said, choking on a sob. “Of course, the turkey, I could do in my sleep.”

“Our house was a repository of our family history, that’s the tough thing, was to lose that,” Jonas sighed as she pointed to the charred trees that stood in front of what once was her home.

“We’ll have to make new history,” she said, patting the tummy of her six-months’ pregnant daughter-in-law, Alicia. “This is the beginning, right here.”

Family history was also the theme of the Seal Beach celebration, where memorabilia from each of three distinct cultures were on display and ancestral stories were swapped.

Before eating, the guests all joined hands for a blessing. At the front of the room, representatives of the three families formed a semicircle: Jackie Nunez of the Acjachemen Indian tribe held a shell full of burning sage and fanned the smoke with a feather; Carl Sorenson, the oldest surviving member of the Mayflower family, held a can of beer.

“We come before you with one body, one soul, one mind,” Nunez prayed in grace before the meal. “Let this be a reminder that only when we come together like this will there be peace and harmony in the world.”

The three families met because one from each works at Spurgeon Intermediate School in Santa Ana.

Schultz, a security guard at the school, is a 12th-generation descendant of John Tilley, one of the first Pilgrims. Joanne Rios Waale, a teacher’s aide, hails from an Indian mission family that built an adobe house in San Juan Capistrano in 1794 and has lived there ever since.

And Eddie Grijalva, a custodian at Spurgeon, is a mestizo: one side of his ancestry comes from the Gabrielino tribe, the other from Juan Pablo Grijalva, a Spanish explorer who came to California in 1775 and was one of Orange County’s first rancheros.

“It’s about time (Indians and Pilgrims ate together). It’s the way it should be,” Grijalva said.