Happy Thanksgiving 2020

Like many of you, I have complained about 2020.  I'm sure most of us agree, not one of our better years, complete with Covid, unemployment, recession, continued murder/harassment of POC, civil unrest, etc.

Well, I am not complaining today.  I am grateful.  Very grateful.  And I want to tell you why.

I am grateful for my health.  Oh, I weigh (alot) more than I should.  I have arthritis, and autoimmunity.  There are a few things I can no longer do.  But so much more I can do.  It's not as easy as it used to be.  But still doable, thank God.

I am grateful that I live in a first-world country that, at least early in this pandemic, looked after its citizens.  No question, most of us would like to see Congress do more.  Not just regular folks, but basically every major economic mind, not the least of which, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, agree on that point.  But the $1200 individual payments, the unemployment, the PEUC, and the unemployment enhancements were as crucial to individuals as broad stimulus outreach was for industries, and the leading reason our country is not in much worse economic shape.  Now that the election is over, let us hope Congress has more moves in its repertoire than finger-pointing, and will continue to find ways to assist those who need it, and offer first aid to our economy during this latest Covid wave.

I am grateful for this time.  Yes, even though I'm unemployed.  A small sabbatical was welcome after all these years, and an opportunity to take care of several matters around my house, long neglected, is a blessing.  Some landscaping, painting, remodeling.  I will REALLY be grateful when it comes time to sell my house, and there will be much less to do than there otherwise would have been.

Not to mention the time I get to spend with a certain gorgeous hunk of man with green eyes, and the most amazing moustache.  Check him out:

I'm grateful for good neighbors.  Right after I was laid off in March, my bathroom faucet and pipe of course decided to spring a leak.  We asked our neighbor, Dan, to help us shut off our water.  He wound up coming over with "some parts that were laying around", and fixed the leaks, refusing the money I offered him.  Then a few weeks ago, he and his wife, Debbie, rented a trailer to clean up a brush pile in their yard, and came over, and we cleaned up a brush pile of mine, too, left over from all my yard trimming this spring.  There is no way to express enough gratitude for neighbors like these.  Dan said to pay it forward.  I'm doing my best.

I am grateful for friends, and with everything we are dealing with this year, I believe we must really prioritize our friendships, take care of and nurture them.  Unfortunately, it does seem that the political and social polarization of America has taken a toll on some of our friendships.  Some of us have, sadly, had to distance ourselves, or even prune some people from our lives.  In some cases it has felt like an emotional amputation.  I can empathize.  Hopefully other friends are willing to sometimes literally drop everything and come up big for us, and us for them.  I have experienced this, as well, as I hope you have.

I am VERY grateful that the US chose new leadership, and shall not have to continue to endure this puerile, chaotic and exhausting administration much longer.  (55 days, but who's counting?!)

Most of all I am grateful to still have my mother.  I almost lost her this spring, not for the first time.  Every holiday could be her last.  I am grateful I was able to afford Thanksgiving Day dinner with all the trimmings, and that I'm going to be able to make it, and enjoy it with my mother at our leisure this year, a rather unlikely prospect most of the years I worked at The Plaza.

I have a handful of movies that I reserve to watch at Thanksgiving.  I just finished watching one of them, a movie called Latter Days.  A character in that movie described reading comics in the newspaper when he was young.  One day, he held the newspaper really close to his eyes and noticed that, close up, the images were comprised of very small, seemingly random colorful dots, and only when looking at them from far away, kind of a God's-eye, not-trees-but-forest view, did all the images make sense, and look like comics.  He said stepping back and looking at life from the forest view made him feel like we are all connected, and that is beautiful, and funny, and good.  I hope that some day soon, 2020 will look like that to us, and that we can all begin to feel a release from this trying time, and for those who are so inclined, maybe even a trust in Something Higher.