Many Thanks

Today is my favorite holiday of the year! Thanksgiving: the day to take a moment and reflect on all the wonderful gifts in your life. Of course, you can, and should (!) do this daily; but today, we do this in a house that smells of turkey, onion and pie spices amongst the people we hold most dear. What’s not to be grateful for?

I’ve been taking stock and counting my blessings all month. Sometimes I try to rank the things that are most important. Many things have changed in my life over the last few years. Some things are changing currently. I’ve gained much and lost some in the process. I’ve let go of some things that turned my heart inside out. There’s still more of that to do. In those moments, I am grateful for the knowledge that while there is a lot lost in the release, there is much to gain to fill the empty spaces those losses provide.

Foremost, I am thankful for my children and all the love and life lessons they provide me. They fill our home with laughter and our hearts with warmth and happiness. I am thankful for the opportunity to guide their young spirits and; I hope, show them their potential is endless. All the while getting to revel in the uniqueness of their thoughts and the boundlessness of their love.

There seems to be no all encompassing words to delineate the gratitude I feel for my family (I count my husband in this. At some point, when I wasn’t looking, he went beyond being ‘that guy I dated and married’ to ‘my family’). Each person brings such different gifts! Laughter, wisdom, perspective, friendship, not to mention the partnership and respect borne of working together on a near-daily basis! I will not pretend the moments when it is all a little too close for comfort do not exist, but equally so are the moments when not close enough exist. At those times, it is good to go work with someone you like as much as you love. I'm glad I get to do that, too.

The life I have is also a tremendous blessing. The home located smack in the center of the story of my youth that mingles with the story that is being drafted currently; the farm that speaks of generations of family and history, of hard work and great love. The pleasure of writing and working and spending days peering into the future through the eyes of the under ten set. It’s not an extremely lucrative life; but it is an incredibly rewarding one.

Good friends. Second Chances. Stars and planets! Raindrops and rainbows. I am grateful for those moments when you realize it is entirely possible the best is still ahead of you. So while I am grateful for yesterday and today, I am even more thankful for all the tomorrows yet to come!

Happy Thanksgiving!