Thankful Thoughts

Today, America is celebrating Thanksgiving. Being British, I’m not.

</endofpost>

Of course, I’m joking; that isn’t the end of this post but I’m still not going to celebrate Thanksgiving. However, I did think that it was a great opportunity to mention some of the things and people in my life that I am thankful for.

So, here are just a few things that I am thankful for in my life. I guess they are sometimes things that are taken for granted because they are always there, which means you may only realise how thankful you were when they’re gone. The trouble is that too many people take too many things for granted. And if these things were gone they would be sorry.

I’m thankful that I don’t live in poverty and that I do get a good wholesome meal everyday with running water straight to my house. I’m thankful for the fact that I have had a fairly good education and am therefore able to type this right now. I’m also thankful for having somewhere warm to live and sleep. I think those are the more mundane things that I should be thankful for. There are some people who don’t have them and I’m sure that they would appreciate them so very much if they did.

I’m thankful for my hands. I think that if I lost my hands it would break my heart. That may sound silly, but without them everything I love would be so very hard and unfulfilling. I wouldn’t be able to write or even type without a lot of difficulty. I’d probably need a lot of help just to get my stories down in a physical form. I think that would hurt a lot more than most other things that could happen to me.

I’m thankful for my parents and everything they do for me. I know that they work hard and always have to make sure that my life is a relatively good one. Sometimes I may complain about them, but I also realise that without them I would not be the person that I am today.

I’m thankful for my friends who ignore my failures, stupidity and weirdness and continue to associate themselves with me. By now, I think I’ve figured out who my true friends are. They are the ones who stick by me, support me, cheer me up when I’m down and do their best to ignore me when I’m annoying.

I thoroughly appreciate everything they do for me. I’m glad they stick around and that they’re there when I need someone to talk to, even if some of them are further away than most. I’m glad that they do their utmost to support me both emotionally and in my writing endeavours where some others would have told me just to give up.

I’m thankful for my colleague at work without whose company my job would be fairly monotonous and difficult. I’m thankful for my cats and dogs, despite the fact that they like to irritate me.

And I’m thankful for my boyfriend, R. He should be commended simply for putting up with me. He always does his best to take care of me, even when I am being idiotic or stubborn. I’m thankful for the fact that he cares a lot not just about himself or the people around him. I’m especially appreciative of the fact that he bothers to listen when I ramble away about the various things that are going on in my head or in my life and that he attempts to make sense of some of them.

I’m definitely thankful for his new found DIY skills in the area of wardrobe building, even though I’m aware that my clutter has irritated him to no end whilst he was crafting his project. And I’m also very grateful for the many times he’s gone out of his way to drive me from one place of work to another, despite it being completely out of his way.

There are plenty more things that I’m thankful for, but I think that these few are those that I should especially mention right now. I may not celebrate Thanksgiving, but I guess that this post is in tune with the Christmas season. After all, that’s about being thankful for those around you, isn’t it?

Speaking of Christmassy things, today we here in the UK had our first snowfall of the winter. Of course, I was out at work in it this morning where it was quite dangerous. The road didn’t seem to be gritted properly and the children were sliding all over as they walked to school. We also had a near accident, which was worrying.

But, as my final act in this post, this is the view from my window at about 7am this morning: