Gratitude and Thanksgiving

It's Thanksgiving in the U.S. tomorrow, a day of eating, connecting with family and friends, and, presumably, being grateful. I suspect that, at least among the people I know, gratitude is mostly a vague, generalized awareness, mainly that the busy holiday season is upon us.  This holiday for many people means an annual ritual of travel, cooking, watching football, overeating and shopping--and nothing more. 

I wish everyone could be silent for a while on this day, savor the moment, and truly feel thankful, especially for the things we take for granted.  Isn't happiness found in being mindful of the present?

Being grateful is essential to my life because, amid personal struggles, political turmoil, and world-wide violence and corruption, I need to stop and think positive thoughts.  I need to remind myself of simple things--the intense blue of the sky between two pine trees as I look out my window, or the light as it comes into the house in the afternoon...I am grateful for the beautiful lakes that dot my area of Florida and the touches of autumn in colored leaves on cool days.

I am grateful for the friends and family who write or call us at this time of year.  I am grateful for those times in the day when I don't feel the pain of arthritis and become irritable or sad about my health.  Of course, I am grateful for a rich store of memories--of students going back 50-plus years, of trips, of family gatherings by many who are no longer around.  Above all, I am grateful for my wife, Lynn, and her brilliance, her hard work, her constant support and boundless love.

I am grateful to have had a retirement from university teaching that has allowed me to write and speak and keep learning new things, thanks to the internet and related technology.  And I am grateful for so much more....

Gratitude is for me the essence of prayer, and I like to think that in each moment when I recollect something to be thankful for, at any time of the year, I am talking to God, connecting myself to my inner life as well as to the community of people I know and remember. It's hard to imagine real gratitude without a belief in God.

And it's hard to imagine happiness without gratitude.