Giving Thanks?

     Roll out the chesnuts, the warm ones we hold and the verbal ones we speak. It's Thanksgiving Day in the United States, arguably the most American of holidays, and some would add, a cliche factory of enormous output.

     An "attitude of gratitude," recovering folks and others suggest, is a perfect counter balance to cynicism, discouragement and despair. Those last attitudes certainly have plenty of evidence to commend them, especially in times of economic hardship for many, and ongoing poverty and diminished possibilities for many others.

     How, exactly, does it make any sense to be grateful for being unemployed? Being sick? Being away from loved ones on a holiday like so many men and women in the military overseas? Being in a hospital with a gravely ill  child? Does God (or Something) play favorites? What's it all about, Alfie? Even if Alfie had a clue, should he or we be grateful? How?

     Also, if one is uncertain or wavering or downright hostile about to whom (Whom?) one gives thanks, does it make any sense to simply be grateful?

     I think it does. I would list my wife, our children and grandchildren, friends, colleagues, a home, a car, health, breath, work, and the great world of trees, water, woods and oceans all around us. It's certainly feels emotionally positive to call those things and so much more to mind. I feel calmer and feeling grateful  about those things seems to balance out the sorrows, the disappointments and the sometimes terrible things that happen in this imperfect world.

     In my experience, there are gifts in the rubble, positives arising out of the hard times and setbacks. Years ago, at the height of the AIDS epidemic (just before the cocktail of meds gave so many longer life, many still with us, thank God), I worked at a Brooklyn hospital where people with that illness and their caretakers came for support. They taught me that a single meal digested without upchucking was a treasure. That an uninterrupted night's sleep or just an hour of unlabored breathing could be more precious than any gold.

     Yeah, it makes sense to find things to be grateful for, and to find a way to express and feel that. There can be moments of light in the darkness, and wonderful gifts beyond hope that can arise from the saddest of circumstances. You and I would not be who we are without every single bit of our life. And we can certainly give thanks for who we are, perfectly imperfect as we are.

     Happy thanks giving.