Eric Frydenlund
Like many of you, I'm traveling on Thanksgiving. Our kids rotate the hosting of the holiday, and this year I’ll be at the home of one of my daughters, albeit the one who lives closest to us.
Traveling requires that we transport our thanks across the land. Along the way, we have the opportunity to give our appreciation to convenience store clerks, gate agents, flight attendants, pilots and fellow travelers on the road and in the air. We can be thankful for more than just the volume of food on our plates and football on our TVs.
We can start a list of the people and events we are thankful for, sort of like a Christmas shopping list. My list would begin with my wife and family, who put up with my nonsense with generous hearts and allow plenty of room for my quirky behavior.
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I am thankful for the incandescent sunsets that adorn the winter holidays, spreading colors across the horizon as if flowing from an endless river of luminous paint. According to Greg Dewhurst, a senior operational meteorologist, “The main factor for better sunsets in the winter months than the summer months is … the sun angle. In winter, the sun is lower in the sky for much longer than in the summer months, so the sunsets and sunrise colors have much more time to build.”
We can be thankful for the laws of nature that coalesce in the sky for our pleasure.
My list would not be complete without the companionship of our dogs over the years. They are purveyors of unconditional love. As I write this, Gil rests his head in my lap, a palpable sign of appreciation that requires no corresponding gesture other than a scratch behind his ear. Gestures given without expectation rise to the top of my list.
We can be equally thankful for the camaraderie of our fellow humans. I was at the clinic recently to take blood tests for my annual checkup. In the process of taking my blood sample, the nurse shared a story. It seems she and her friends get together annually for a “fishing trip” that rivals the annual expeditions of their husbands. A bartender, hearing the nature of their trip, went into the backroom and nailed a beer can to a board and presented it to them as a “fishing trophy,” which they now carry with them on every trip.
The same holds true for my annual get-together with my childhood friends. It began as a fishing trip, survived 20 years of pranks and mischief, and continues today as a trip of friendship -- with some fishing mixed in for good measure. It requires some humility to be thankful for feeling the sharp end of a well-placed barb, but joining in the laughter heals the wound.
Thankfulness for companionship is reciprocal. It has no landing place without another living being as party to the exchange.
Of course, making a list of what you are thankful for is rather like reciting all the events that have brought you here to this fortuitous moment of being alive. They are too numerous to mention. Thankfulness exists as a state of being that requires no accounting.
Finally, I am grateful to you for reading what I write. I often receive emails from readers who shine a new light on a topic, allowing me to look at the world in a different way. These thoughts land in my inbox without warning and without expectation, bringing to a close the circle of give and take.
So to all of you, it may seem trite to say, but it’s not said enough on this Thanksgiving or any day: Thank you.
Frydenlund lives in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin: epfrydenlund@gmail.com. He wrote this for the Wisconsin State Journal.
