Thanksgiving

Despite the difficulties that life has thrown my way, the hardships, the tears, the pain, the unhappiness, I am grateful and I am thankful.

I try to live every day of my life this way, not simply one week or one day of every year. But this is a national day of being Thankful and it's a good time to think back on this past year as well as the years that have passed, to remember and to share the great many reasons that I am lucky, that I am hopeful, that I am blessed.

I am thankful for beautiful sunrises and friends to share them with. I am thankful for crunchy leaves and comfortable, cute shoes. I am thankful for a hot cup of coffee and cream and the friends who make such beautiful vessels for the drink. I am thankful for the lamp that sits beside my reading/writing chair in the library and the friend who hauled it nearly 2,000 miles from Minnesota, through Canada, so that I could have it back in Oregon with me. I am thankful for the grandparents, who have both now passed, who bought that lamp at an auction for me in the first place so I could have a light to read by in my freshman dorm. I am thankful to live in a world where I am surrounded by books and creativity, where I get to meet other writers who inspire me and challenge me. I am thankful for the ocean, the way it roars, the way it mesmerizes, the secrets it tells me. I am thankful for the feeling of sand between my toes and pedicures. I am thankful for little brothers who have grown up into such interesting and thoughtful men who never forget to be awesome. I am thankful for Doctor Who and David Tennant. I am thankful for Zelda, with her brown eyes and sweet heart. I am thankful for long walks and swing sets. I am thankful for cozy blankets and lazy afternoons. I am thankful for a car that never gives me trouble and takes me on road trips to visit old friends. I am thankful for the Nerdist Podcast and the many ways it inspires and makes me laugh and think. I am thankful for a husband who lets me be who I am and loves me unconditionally. I am thankful that he is also quite handsome and rather smart. I am thankful for all the assorted technology in my life that lets me write, take photos, be entertained, and allows me to communicate with loved ones near and far. I am thankful for Legos and the interesting and beautiful things I can create with them. I am thankful for music and all those songs that hit me right in the gut. I am thankful for NaNoWriMo and the way it got my writing life reinvigorated, how it showed me that I could write a hundred pages (or 400 pages...). I am thankful for having enough food to eat and that I have the luxury of eating out when I want to.

I am truly thankful I have all these things to be thankful for and that I could spend the entire day writing down even more things to be thankful for.

And if you're out shopping tomorrow, be thankful for the person who's helping you because they probably didn't get to relax as much as they wanted to or spend as much time as they wanted to with their family. Remember it's not their fault if something is sold out or not available or that you had to wait in a line longer than you wanted to.