Thankful

This is the week for thankfulness. Thanksgiving Day is this Thursday. A day for gathering those closest to us. Not all can join the grouping, but they are with the rest in thought. Separation by space is not always solvable, but we can call, email, write or in some way connect with the other. That is a snap these days; not so in years gone by.


I remember the $5 long distance phone call, if not more! Writing took several days for the letter or card to reach the intended party. A telegram seemed idiotic when a phone call was faster and more certain.


Getting in the car and driving 5, 50 or 500 miles was an option. Often that was preferred. To be with one another. That was the goal.


When I was in college, I was 1000 miles from home. Thanksgiving Day was thus spent with others who became very close – college roommate and his family 100 miles from campus. The long four-day weekend provided time for us to meet other college mates in Chicago and explore the city. We attended the symphony, Broadway musicals traveling the country, museums and theaters. Always we met for dinners in special restaurants. We had a great time and spread our wings.


My family, though, was in New York. My brother, too, and my sister in California. Spread out in those days, like today. We still reside far from each other. Sister is in Phoenix. Brother is in Rochester, New York. I’m here in Chicago area. Mom and dad are gone now. So too, all of the grandparents, aunts and uncles. Our cousins are old like us and distant in both space and relationship. Those ties have grown dusty and nearly forgotten. Too many unshared life experiences. Not quite strangers, but certainly not close.


Friends now have become like family. We choose them often with which to dine, talk, commune. Life experiences determined by our ages often define our ready closeness. We have shared the comings and goings of historical change. We understand the present with common sight of the past. We also can envision the future with similar experiences intact.

We can view news together and recall where we each were at critical times. Recently, John F. Kennedy's assassination was 56 years ago. That not only reminds us of days long gone by, but the 'when' of our lives at that time. Our budding awareness of the possibilities of our lives yet ahead. Our yearning for connecting with those possibilities and to try our hand at doing better than current leadership. Our hopes for professionals, study, research, extending knowledge, teaching and building a wholesome future.

We remind ourselves of 9/11 and what it meant to us then and today. We are reminded of the three impeachment efforts of presidents in our lifetimes. What is similar; what is not.

We are thankful for perspective. And wisdom; somehow we have garnered that. Like old pooh-bahs of earlier times, we remember elders sharing their perspective with us. Then we didn't appreciate it. Now it is ours to appreciate and understand.

Perhaps we can be thankful to listen to one another this week to find the wisdom we can share. And value one another. And be thankful for all of that.

November 25, 2019