I’ve spent every November for the past seven years blogging about something I’m grateful for nearly every day. Two years I made it every day. Most years I end up with 21 or so posts. This year is shaping up to be just that.
I read this article from the New York Times that validates my focus on gratitude, though I’m certain the author is saying I need to be grateful more often than just November. He’s right. He included a poem from Gerard Manley Hopkins about being grateful for the mundane, those “small, useless things you experience,” and I realized this year, as in years past, I try to look for something grand each day, a gratitude epiphany, if you will.
Instead of looking for something grand, today I’m grateful for sunshine streaming in my windows, for time to practice the piano, for comfy clothes to change into after church, for brownies made from scratch.
This week, I plan to revel in the mundane and be grateful for it. Because (and here’s the epiphany) if I’m finding I’m grateful for the mundane, chances are life is pretty good.
Emily in Our Town, Act 3: “Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it?–every, every minute?” I’ve never taught this until this year; I see signs of the importance of noticing all the little things about life and the people I love all around me now, and I’m reminded of this play all the time! I take too many things for granted. . . .
So do I, Kathy. I take so much for granted. Really going to focus this last week on not doing that.