Leftover Thanksgiving Crumbs

The idea of a day where we reflect on the things we’re thankful for sounds easy enough. If you’re reading this, you’re probably reading it on a computer, which means you probably have a lot to be thankful for.


I’m writing this on a computer and I know that I have a lot to be thankful for, but the truth is that I feel like I tend to do the opposite of what this holiday is meant to be. My thoughts gravitate to whatever’s missing, whatever’s lost or broken or painful. My heart worries and fears. There is plenty to be thankful for but those are not the scenes I stay stuck in.


I wish I was better at being present. Perhaps you can relate. And it’s not that I don’t have plenty to be happy about. There is more than plenty. My life is absurd in terms of how privileged it is. Lucky.


So I guess I’m writing for two reasons.


1. We deserve the space to be human. To be real, to be honest. To be a mess, to cry, to laugh while crying, to do whatever you need to do… Now, my guess is the idea of going there in front of your awkward Aunt ________ probably doesn’t sound like much fun. So maybe you don’t. Maybe you do your best today. To be present. To think about the other people in the room. To ask questions and to try to care for the people around you and to let those people care for you.


But it goes back to the first part. You deserve the space to be human. Family chooses us but we get to choose our community. Our friends. Our support system. We were meant to be known, to be loved, to be in honest relationships where we can be carried and where we can help carry.


2. I wonder if it’s possible to get to a place of being thankful for the dreams that feel fractured, for things we loved but lost. I wonder if it’s possible to get to a place of believing that we are shaped by all of it, that we are stronger and wiser for what we’ve walked through. What if the things that ended – the things that broke your heart – what if it was the end of a chapter but the story keeps going? What if life comes back? What if love comes back? What if you would not be who you are and you would not know what you know if not for it all?


I'm starting to believe those things, that the best is yet to be, that life comes back, that the dreams that live inside me are there for a reason, that life is not just a tragedy, not just a story about losing.