Gratitude Hangover

Someone in my news feed yesterday posted a quote something relative to the fact that happy people aren’t grateful, grateful people are happy.  It’s something that – at this transient point in my life – is settling into my soul.

I don’t know if you can call it a natural progression of my human nature – that in spite of nearly twenty years of wanderlust and fear of trusting my roots to not be ravaged by settling in some earth – I have found my way home.  Both literally and metacognitively. 

But here we are, the morning after the prescribed day of thanks.  I am sitting quietly in my office, sipping a delicious cup of coffee while some friends are sleeping on my couch.  And life. is. good.  

Maybe it’s jumping on the bandwagon to write up a list of things right now.  Maybe that bandwagon has already left the station as I see all the people who wallowed in gratitude yesterday on Facebook revel presently in their Black Friday shopping victories… but… this blog is more for me than anyone else.  But if you feel like reading, so much the better.

 What fills me with gratitude on this November morning: 

1. Family.  It’s a cliché.  It’s redundant.  But I feel it now it so much more than any time in my life.  Maybe the closest to this realization came when I was 18 and my grandfather was sick, so we rallied to support my grandmother the caretaker and each other.  This year the gatherings are not as frequent.  But there is this wonderful thing the internet that connects us 20 years later… maybe even on a different and more appreciative level than the hollers over pizza, pie, and beer. 
Of course, the sad truth is I recognize this because it is set against the great contrast of my grandmother’s loss, an emptiness my reality still has to adjust to.  But I have tried to fill that emptiness by cooking her recipes and compiling the stories I heard from her – and as I realized sitting around the table after dinner over the dredges of wine bottles yesterday, I’m going to have to start collecting the stories from my family.  It is a way of having her with me… but also knowing her as a woman.  Not that I did not know her as a woman… but when she was here, I mostly just saw her as my Gram.  I know that is an identity in which she took enormous pride and joy… but there was a whole half of her life lived before we came along.  When she was a beautiful, flirtatious (as was remarked by several sons-in-law yesterday),  smart, funny, independent, related to a family only seen in photographs, loving, woman.  There are so many questions I wish I could have thought of to ask her… but there is also something now in seeing her against the whole of her life… and seeing how that influenced the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren in becoming equally remarkable and loving individuals in our many varied lives. 

2. This country ‘cottage.’  I never, in my wildest dreams would have thought I would consider living in the back woods of central MA where I spent my high school years.  I’ve always been sentimental for this property.  There is something about the neighboring lake and the quiet of the trees and the overgrown foundations hidden just slightly off the road that is very conducive to one’s imagination.  But… I work in Boston.   I had a whole life in Boston… or even just the city of Worcester.  But there is something so magically calming about being here.  I have yet to figure out where this road will take me… but I like being here.  I feel like that has helped to soothe some of the troubled waters within my soul.   

3. The Worcester Writers Collaborative.  This never ceases to amaze me.  I know my attention to my novel has been rather lackluster… but the fact we all get together every Tuesday helps me from abandoning it altogether.  It also connects me to so many amazing writers throughout central MA.  It’s great for conversation.  It’s great for friendships.  And honestly, the best thing is seeing someone who doesn’t know what to do with their writing take a leap and finish a novel or publish a novel… and just go out there and do it.  It is really, really awesome.  And the other surprising and wonderful thing is reconnecting with a kindergarten friend, sharing our mutual loves of writing, cheese, and Worcester.  

4.Theater.  Talk about a rocky relationship.  I’ve had so many highs and lows throughout my life where this artistic interest is concerned.  And maybe it’s not theater… maybe it’s me… a truth I was starting to wonder when the lows kept repeating themselves.  But then, out of nowhere, I was invited to take part in Crimes of the Heart this September.  It was one of those experiences that reminded me why I love it so much.  It connected me to some amazing friends with whom I will continue going to awesome karaoke, doing more theater, and sharing meals.  I got to work with a director who gave me a very similar experience ten years ago.  And I remembered that theater really is one of those amazing pieces of art where the unreal happens itself into real. 

5.  Supper Club.  I love, love, love my supper club.  I love that people come all the way out to my country house to eat in the dining room and fill this house with such happy energy.  I love the themes and the willingness of my friends to not only embrace it but run with it.  I love that there are always new faces, but so many familiar friends.  I love that we aren’t just friends on the virtual stage, but can linger in conversation around the table until the tapers are significantly burnt down and the empty wine bottles are aplenty.

I could go on… but I need more coffee, and I suspect my guests have awakened.  I look back over this list and realize the common theme is the people in my life.  My family and my friends.  They inspire me to pursue all the other things that make me happy – cooking, writing, acting – because, really those are just ways I can connect with kindred spirits.  And that, more than anything is what makes me sit back and say, yeah life is good.