On this fantabulous friday, as I wrap up my latest trip to Valdosta and Bethlehem (aka “home”) and prepare to head back out to the wild, wild west (aka Tucson), I can’t help but think about gratitude.
It seems like such an easy thing, gratitude. The act of being grateful. Thankfulness. But it really isn’t all that easy. Life sweeps by me, day by day, and I forget to find the joy, find the things to be thankful for, find the deep well of appreciation that surely should reside within me because I truly have so much to be grateful for. So. Much. There are the things that are day to day, like the life I live, the work I love, the friends who are my support structure in a world that ever-shifts, the family that constantly surprises me with their insight, making me believe that all those sibling fights really were just the hard part that paved the way for the easy part of being friends with them as we become adults, and the husband that loves me no matter where I am in the world. But it goes even deeper than that, for me.
I have found immense joy in the smaller things, the less obvious things, the things that I encountered in the last 6 days – such a short period of time, filled with so much. The fallen leaves that blanket the ground in all the lovely places I get to travel back to. The smell of rain that brings with it the brisk scent of winter. The friends who allow me to stay with them when I travel and grocery shop to my specifications based only on previous observations of what I love (thank you, Kate, you’re the BEST). The high school friends that I can still celebrate with and dance in a circle with at a wedding and remember when we were 17 and singing the same song, with so much of life still ahead of us, so much unknown and full of promise. The shocking insight of a younger brother who floors me with his astute observations. My new sister-in-law, an amazing addition to our family and one I can imagine truly thinking of as a sister. The families of the last four days who are no longer just clients, but cherished friends, friends who have children that I have watched grow and change, friends who love me and what I do enough to wait for me to come back before we all scatter once again to the four corners of the earth, on the whim and will of the military.
These are the things, today, that I am grateful for.
What are you grateful for, today?
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