Tonight I am grateful for having had a relatively quiet day. I was tired, having risen early to take my son to catch the train into the city for work (this after picking him up from the train last night at midnight.) I nodded off over my journal this morning and didn’t write my usual number of pages before I had to jump up to drive J to work. When I got home I walked and fed the dog, made myself some breakfast, then spent some time on my computer paying bills, reviewing position descriptions on job sites, and puttering around doing relatively useful things (versus vegging out on Facebook) but not sustaining effort on any one thing. I had a lovely lunch with my friend Roland, catching up with him after what had seemed like months without connecting. And when I returned from that, enjoyed a phone call catching up with a friend from Israel, followed immediately by a call from my daughter. It was a good, if relatively underproductive day. In some ways it was just what I needed.
Tonight I am going to offer simple gratitudes for the basics that caught my attention. First, it was a positively beautiful day here. I didn’t spend enough time out in the weather today, but I did spend some. The weekend promises to be just as beautiful, so shame on me if I don’t take myself out in it at least for a little while. And I’ve been promising the dog to get her back out to the Park. We stopped walking there once I no longer needed to drive my son to his job that was very close to the Park. The dog has suffered and I have as well, not only getting less exercise and fresh air, but also missing the feast for the eyes that comes from the views of the San Francisco Bay, the Golden Gate, Bay, and Richmond Bridges, and the entertaining wildlife that lives in or frequents the Park. As deeply grateful as I’ve been to have steady work and the income from it, I miss the afternoons that I had free to walk the mile and a half around the park several days per week. I am grateful for the beautiful weather and am looking forward to spending some time in it this weekend if I can get enough work done so I can enjoy myself guilt free.
I am grateful to have spent part of the afternoon with my friend Roland, catching up with him and hearing about what’s going on in his life. It was nice to listen to someone else talk about their life–joys and challenges–and be able to be fully present with him without thinking or talking about my own situation. While we eventually did get around to catching up with what was going on in my life, I was perfectly content to have spent a nice chunk of the conversation talking about him. I appreciate the way he checks in with me–not weekly or several times per week like my friend Mary and I check in, but every few weeks or so as best we can. I value whatever time we find to hang out and am always glad to see him. I don’t have large numbers of friends–I probably have just a handful of people outside of my siblings with whom I share my life and they share theirs with me. They each take up different and unique spaces in my heart and I deeply value my connections with each of them. I am grateful to each of them for who they are and how they show up in my life.
One more simple gratitude: I love inspiring words and quotes. I have yellow stickies with encouraging and uplifting quotes stuck up around where I can see them. After I wrote yesterday’s blog about perseverance, this morning I ran across the following quote. It seemed an appropriate exclamation point to many of the blogs I’ve written on the subject.
“I learned how to summon, from somewhere deep within, the extra will I didn’t know I possessed. Knowing it was there, and could be tapped again, gave me the boost of confidence I would rely on for years to come.” — Sugar Ray LeonardThat quote resonates so strongly with how I’ve felt about the ability to draw strength from a seemingly inexhaustible wellspring inside of me. Always something to be grateful for, never something to take for granted, I continue to be amazed and thankful that it is there.
Today was a good day, and I am grateful. I am grateful for each moment as it comes, is here, then passes. I might not like all of them, but I am grateful for them. What are you grateful for today?
