I guess the days leading up to December are as good a time as any to quote Dickens. The last year truly has been "the best of times and the worst of times." For all the hurt there's been equal amounts of good. No longer defined by my weight I now can enjoy the good and deal better with the hurt. But, before Christmas there's Thanksgiving. And with much respect to that great American sportswriter Furman Bisher (and with much trepidation about cliche overdose) here's some things for which I'm grateful:
I see a cute child and I can pinch a cheek and make it giggle without worrying that the child's going to tell me that I'm fat. During the "fat days" I was constantly called out and humiliated by the honest, hurtful words of children. They're brutally honest but, sadly, seem to have not quite as many manners as we did when we were kids (Oh dear GOD, I can't believe I just said that...pretty soon I'll be starting sentences with "In my day....")
I'm thankful that I can now wear Georgia Tech clothes proudly (after buying them off a rack and not from the "God, you're huge!" catalog.)
I'm thankful that I followed Mother around the kitchen all those years and I can now walk in my own kitchen and cook some of her dressing for tomorrow's festivities. She was a good teacher. I'm also glad that there's a bite of her raisin pie in my future. My sister does a good job of recreating that slice of heaven (I told you...cliche overdose.) Speaking of heaven, if I get there I'll know it because it'll smell just like Mother's kitchen the day before Thanksgiving.
I'm thankful for the opportunity to look at a dog seemingly asleep in the sun on the patio...but seeing her nose twitching a thousand miles an hour I know she's smelling everything in the neighborhood.
I'm thankful to be at an age where I can appreciate really simple pleasures...like a good cup of coffee.
I'm thankful for friends who I don't talk to near enough,,,but know that if I needed them they'd be a phone call away.
I'm thankful that so many of my clothes can fit into my chest of drawers. My old clothes took up a lot of room!
I'm thankful that I'm never too old to be three women's little brother.
I'm thankful for in-laws that treat me like their son...and appreciate the doses of "Methodist cough syrup" I bring into their Southern Baptist household.
Most of all, I'm thankful that she doesn't think it's a chore to be married to a knucklehead like me. I'm grateful to God that her's is the first face I see every morning.......