The holidays, including Thanksgiving, are a time for reflection. For a city like Buffalo, which prides itself on the spirit of giving back, moments of gratitude are amplified and are not difficult to find this time of year.
Since the beginning of the year, Ryan has worked seven days a week with three jobs. That alone is their motivation for giving back.
"With those hours that I have that I'm not giving to my boss to make money, I see the abundance that I'm accumulating," they said. "I naturally want to share it."
On a chilly afternoon, Ryan was one of the few individuals in Lafayette Square distributing pre-cooked meals for free through the volunteer movement called "Food, Not Bombs".
"It is an all-volunteer movement dedicated to taking nonviolent direct action through mutual aid," said Milo, another organizer of Food, Not Bombs. "Every Monday and Saturday, we come here to Lafayette Square with some pre-cooked vegan meals and we hand them out to whoever wants to come by."
Challenges faced throughout the year by the community bring forth different levels of introspection on what individuals are grateful for and a new perspective on gratitude. For Ryan, it was family.
"I'm leaving a long-term relationship and I'm coming back with family," they said. "You never know how grateful you'll feel to be with family until you're really with them. And so the way that makes you feel that there's nothing else."
The last few months have also given others a new look at what it means to be grateful. Guinevere, an advocate for Food, Not Bombs, said that the election cycle challenged their perspective on gratitude.
"I've always said it's perspective based on the current situation," they said. "I'm trying to learn how to work with what we have and be grateful for what we have and the opportunities that are available to us now."
When challenges come, Buffalo leans on the community because the community comes through.
"It goes back to just showing up for one another all the time, knowing that we have each other's backs," said Milo. "That's something to be grateful for, and I think that other people would feel the same."
"I'm grateful for community," said Guinevere. "I've become very involved in the queer community in Buffalo just this year, and it's been really exciting."
Gratitude amongst people in the community can be seen reflected in Buffalo.
"Acknowledging that the situations might not be great," said Guinevere, "but we do have resources and people who care about things like this [Food, Not Bombs] very sincerely and then being grateful."