Solstice Gratitude List

NOTES ON GRATITUDE

I had a million things to do this morning, so many they woke me at 3:30, clamoring for my attention, pulling me out of a dream about a car careening out of control. I brush on some mascara, let the dogs out, check email, race to the club, get in a quick workout, and rush off to the coffee shop. I grab a cappuccino, exchange a quick joke with the Barista, and forget to appreciate my first foamy sip. I open the to-do list that is weighing on my brain. What do I have to get done today? Critique pieces for my writing group, answer emails, return phone calls, vacuum because my grand-baby is coming, figure out an Hors’duerve for my writing group, get to the Loft by 11:00. Get home by 3:00 for the baby, get to my friend, Sharon’s by 4:30. Oh, and find a poignant poem about the winter solstice, or was it supposed to be a poem about gratitude? I search the web, realize I can’t possibly take someone else’s words for gratitude, and instead quickly type Gratitude at the top of the page.

 

GRATITUDE

Okay, what am I grateful for?

·         I’m grateful for my brain, that for all practical purposes, has never let me down

·         I’m grateful for my grandbaby’s breath that carries just a whisper of mother’s milk as I hold his sleeping body nestled into my neck.

And finally, maybe for the first time today, I slow down long enough to take a deep breath.

 

·         I’m grateful for my teenager’s vibrating exuberance that launches him into every day where anything’s possible, and given his trauma free childhood, he jumps in to the mix with the

assumption that all the possibilities are fabulous.

 

And I taste my cappuccino for the first time, even though it’s half gone.

 

·         I’m grateful for my husband, who still loves me after thirty years, and treats me like I still have a great ass even though I maybe never did. Mostly I’m grateful that I had the good sense to marry up, because Jeff has made me a much better person than I could have been without him.

·         I’m grateful for my humility, almost any time it shows up

·         I’m grateful for having the means to help an old friend, who doesn’t have the means himself to buy a Christmas present for his son.

·         I’m grateful the stars light our running path before the sun has gotten to this side of the world

·         I’m grateful for the miraculously still crisp Pink Lady apple I frantically found yesterday during a blood sugar crash moments before the grieving motherless family appears at my door to talk about their first Christmas without her.

·         I’m grateful for my sisters who still love me, even though they’ve been with me through my worst times as a person.

·         I’m grateful for my spirit that has the audacity to hope for the best.

·         I’m grateful that my adult son, who even given the traumas of his childhood, is more committed to his son than to his defensive pessimism…I’m also grateful that he has found a way to get paid for being an artist.

·         I’m grateful for my friends who love me far better than I can love myself

·         I’m grateful for my body, that for all practical purposes, has never let me down

·         I’m grateful for my new agent that assures me it will all be fine.

·         I’m grateful for my heart, that for all practical and impractical purposes, has never let me down.

·         I’m grateful for my first child who inspired me to build a life so amazing, even though he had too few years to physically share it.

 

And now, list forgotten, moment remembered, I’m grateful for:

 

·         Sharon, who faithfully brings her friends together to remember and share what we carry in our hearts.

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~ by lindsaynielsen on May 11, 2008.