| Making a list of gratitudes is an exercise that holds | | | | inheritance from Holland to "New Amsterdam." I |
| renewed power each time it is repeated. One can | | | | am grateful to my mother's parents who brought |
| never be too conscious of everything there is for | | | | their share of my genes from an unhappy |
| which to be grateful. So make a gratitude list | | | | Germany to a new beginning in Connecticut. I am |
| today... and make another one next month, or | | | | grateful to my parents for choosing to bring me |
| maybe next week, or maybe tomorrow. Don't | | | | into the world - 17 years after my only sibling, |
| take ANYTHING for granted... start the list with | | | | and at an age when most couples of their |
| "being alive," and "being ME." List EVERYTHING | | | | generation had completed their childbearing. Just |
| there is to be grateful for... NO Assumptions! NO | | | | genetically, my chances of being ME are |
| Expectations! | | | | infinitesimally small. |
| While you're working on your list, let me share | | | | I am grateful for everything my parents did and |
| mine: I'm grateful to be alive and ME in this instant. | | | | didn't do. I am grateful for the unconditional love I |
| I'm grateful for everything that has ever occurred | | | | received from each of them. I am grateful for |
| to bring me to this moment of being exactly who | | | | the lessons of my father's heavy drinking, and |
| I am today. I'm grateful to my distant ancestors | | | | my mother's fear of strangers. I am grateful both |
| who survived eons of sameness punctuated by | | | | for the joy of my mother's generous readings |
| moments of terror... who fought saber tooth | | | | and other attentions to me, and for the pain my |
| tigers and barely survived each winter in order to | | | | isolated early childhood later caused me. I am |
| pass down the genes that make me who I am | | | | grateful even for the bullying and other painful |
| today. I am grateful to my father's father who | | | | experiences of my youth, as each one made me |
| sailed from China alone as a young boy in the hold | | | | the person I am today. I am grateful for every |
| of a sailing ship, bringing my genes from | | | | success and every failure I have ever had... every |
| desperate hunger to the opportunity of America. I | | | | new love and every divorce... every promotion |
| am grateful to my father's mother and her | | | | and every firing... every smile and every tear. |
| ancestors who brought their part of my biological | | | | There is simply nothing NOT to be grateful for. |