Dear Readers,

We are about to sit down with family and friends to celebrate my favorite holiday — Thanksgiving.

It is a custom that evolved from the 1621 feast celebrated by the Pilgrims.

Of course, Mainers know the Pilgrims were latecomers to our shores, as Europeans had been visiting the coastline for a number of years before the Pilgrims arrived. Some accounts have the Pilgrims sailing to a fishing station on Damariscove Island to acquire food to get them through the winter.

This year, our Boothbay region has a lot of reasons to give thanks.

After several years of an uncertain business climate, many of our friends report that their professional and retail businesses had a pretty good season.

Our shipyards, one of our signature industries, are humming as Washburn & Doughty continues to launch some of the finest tug boats in the world.

Next door in East Boothbay, Hodgdon Yachts launched the racing yacht Comanche, which is on its way to Australia to participate in the Sydney to Hobart race. Its fans say it may be the fastest mono-hull sailing craft ever. They might be right.

Just this week, Boothbay Harbor Shipyard was picked to do the $6 million renovation of the tall ship Ernestine. She is the official sailing ship of Massachusetts and more than a few of our southern neighbors wondered why they shunned their home state yards and sent her to Boothbay for a refit.

We are thankful that our other commercial and pleasure boating facilities are busy, for that means jobs for friends and neighbors.

Area golfers are amazed at the scope of work going on at Paul Coulombe's Boothbay Harbor Country Club. While it means a big change for the old course, it also means jobs and more tax dollars for our community.

As Boothbay town officials unveil their proposals to expand and upgrade the recreational areas at Clifford Park, some naysayers are already carping about change.

We all can be thankful that the public will have a chance to go over the proposed plans with a fine toothed comb. Good, that is as it should be.

When public business is done in public, the public always comes out on the winning side.

Our friends and neighbors are thankful that gasoline and heating oil prices have come down.

We are all thankful the 2014 edition of the political silly season has finally ended. We reelected Gov. Paul LePage. Despite all the annoying TV commercials, we have accepted the results.

Best of luck to our once and future governor. I wish him well in his effort to govern our favorite state.

As always, we are thankful for the chance to be able to cast a ballot in a free election.

We seldom think about it, but access to the ballot box is a privilege denied to much of the rest of the world. It is a birthright we must not neglect.

My father always said if a fellow doesn't vote, he forfeits his right to complain about political decisions.

We all know that is not entirely true, for complaining about politicians, like yelling at the umpire at a ball game, is also part of the American birthright.

And I am thankful for that too.