Thanksgiving: What I'm Thankful For...(But Honestly)

I’ve never really gotten too excited for Thanksgiving.  Frankly it’s boring- you eat, watch TV, and wish it was Christmas instead.  I mean yes, sure, it’s a time to be thankful for all the things in your life, blah blah blah.  I mean I'm off from work, I'm thankful for that little vacation. But randomly stating what your thankful for out loud doesn’t really make you more appreciative.  I mean if you live in the same house all your life, you can say your thankful for it, but do you really know anything else? 

Well this week is when social media and television force you to think about all the things your thankful for.  I mean I guess the whole point of the holiday is to think of one thing, even if it is generic.  I mean people say things like "Family" or "Peace."  It's like okay could you maybe expand on that? Or can you say your thankful for something honest?  Even if it is something as superficial as a good hair day.  I mean at least that’s more believable than you being thankful for “Hope” or “Faith” or “Love.”  You’re not a hallmark card, what you’re thankful for doesn’t have to be a one-word summary.  

Sure no one is going to admit to being thankful for their new iPad or having more money in their bank account, especially after someone just told a beautiful sob story about their dog returning home after weeks of being lost in the wild.  But honestly I have no shame- a small part of me is thankful for my iPad.  I mean yes lessening the amount of people suffering from World Hunger is wonderful but my brain isn’t that caring on a daily basis.  Unless I’m watching a movie like Hotel Rwanda, I kind of forget about these things from day to day.  I mean I still have to live my life each day.  I can't spend every hour and every holiday feeling sorry for a cause that I haven’t even tried to do anything about and then feeling guilty, and then the emotions go so on and so on, until it comes full circle to me being thankful for my iPad on a deeper level because some people don’t even get the opportunity to use a telephone.  And now my brain hurts and I need a nap.

So anyway.  A long list can be written about what I’m thankful for this year, both materialistic and non-materialistic, conceptual and non-conceptual, reality and dreams, and so on.  But who really cares about those things aside from me.

Truthfully I'm thankful for the biggest lesson I learned this year.  I don’t have to be anything or be anyone for anyone else.  It’s not my role or my job in life to lift someone else up or try to understand each and every person.  Sure I can be so many things for so many people, but I don’t want to and I don’t have to.  I'm not a slave to the human mind and its well-being.  Just be who you want to be and do what you want to do.  If someone doesn’t like it- it’s not your problem.

Aside from that- I’m also seriously thankful that the last season of Mad Men got split into two seasons.  And that the next Presidential Election doesn't start for a few more years, therefore I don’t have to hear about everyone else's political views nonstop.  Let’s be real, I don’t even know who’s running and I already know who I’m voting for.