I spent a long train ride home today thinking about how grateful I am for the good things in my life, and how I choose to give back what has been given to me. Typical holiday thoughts brought on by the not so typical start to a Thanksgiving Day (Grandma going on dialysis for kidney failure) and a trip down memory lane, courtesy of my step-dad (once removed by divorce, but always a pillar in my life for his gentle courage and wry wit). We didn’t have to take a detour through my old neighborhood… I had my nose buried in my textbooks, and didn’t even notice that we had pulled up to the apartments where I spent the years 3-6 at, living with my single mom who struggled to get by and still provide a good childhood for me in spite of our poverty. So, of course, I took some pictures. The tree-lined street was like an old friend, with many happy childhood memories of being on the back of the bicycle with the sun shining down through the leaves on the way home.
Oak Park and Downtown Chicago, 2007
It’s odd thinking back to the way the world looked when you were 6. Everything was a possibility, something that you might do someday when you were big enough to finally do things. The world was full of demands, but there was a promise in every sunset– an awareness that life is beautiful.
It’s so easy to lose that in the day-to-day chaos that makes up Life in these United States. You need a sense of humor about the whole circus to stay sane… but I wonder if sometimes the ironic defensive crust that we all develop as life knocks us around is actually less productive than that simple childhood wonder about where you will be five years from now. There’s something to be said for sitting still and feeling the sun on your face and being very much alive, unafraid of what the future holds, completely open to what the moment has to offer and simply happy to be there to experience it.
Giving 110% of everything you have in you to the goal of having a fantastic life, and making it as rich as possible in every way…
Now there’s something to be thankful about.
