What are you thankful for?

Thanksgiving is tomorrow—doesn’t it seem early this year? Or maybe that old adage is true: Once you pass 40, time moves at warp speed.
As you gather with your families to give thanks and break bread, I wish you health and happiness during the holidays and beyond.
I am grateful for so many things this year. As I count my blessings, some are positives and some are negatives. You’ll see what I mean…
I’m thankful for:
•    Not having more aches and pains than I do. My feet are beat all to pieces from running, but my back is fine and my eyes aren’t too bad. (Which means, of course, that I’ll be limping and squinting in a week.)
•    Cut-glass doorknobs.
•    The smell of fall.
•    My exasperating, hilarious 84-year-old mother. May she drive me crazy ‘til she’s 100.
•    My brothers, T-Bob and Bubba, who are everything I’m not, thanks be to God.
•    My sister, Moonbeam, on whatever planet she inhabits these days.
•    Knockout roses.
•    The freshness of just-washed sheets and the delicious feel of feather pillows.
•    Friends both old and new.
•    Marriage to a brilliant, handsome, funny man, who knows all my quirks and loves me anyway. (Turns out normal people don’t snack on mustard by the spoonful.)
•    Books, books and more books. Do not give me a Kindle for Christmas.
•    My perfectly imperfect body. Parts jiggle, wiggle and sag, but it does everything I ask it to do. An everyday miracle.
•    Cheaper gas.
•    The musical jingle of my dog’s collar as she ambles merrily from room to room.
•    The freedom to do, say and be whatever I want as long as it doesn’t break the law or frighten the goats.
•    Our armed forces. Self explanatory.
•    The good health of loved ones, including my 88-year-old mother-in-law, who is way sharper than her 51-year-old daughter-in-law.
•    Tolerance and forgiveness.
•     “Modern Family,” the best sitcom since “M*A*S*H.”
•    My inability to drive a stick-shift, because just trying to learn scared everybody stiff. If God wanted me to drive a five-speed, He’d have given me an extra foot.
•    The way my husband’s eyes crinkle when he smiles.
•    Facebook, without which I would go crazy living in the boondocks.
•    The cozy creaks and groans our old house makes at night.
•    My belief that people are inherently good.
•    Coconut oil. You can cook with it AND use it as a moisturizer.
•    Church ladies who prepare delicious post-funeral receptions, teach Sunday school and coordinate food banks, asking nothing in return.
•    Old Navy jeans.
•    Flannery O’Connor, Carson McCullers and Eudora Welty.
•    Everyone who puts on a uniform to fight fires, arrest bad guys and restart hearts.
•    Hot soup on a cold day.
•    Cold beer on a hot day.
•    Our inversion table. Apparently I’ve been longing all my life to hang upside down.
•    A phone that actually keeps me from getting lost. Who knew?
•    The ability to run.
•    Comfortable running shoes.
•    Country roads to run on.
•    The kindness and generosity I see practiced around me daily.
•    My favorite snack: peanuts, Craisins and dark chocolate chips.
•    Good neighbors.
•    Scarves that A) keep my neck warm, and B) hide my neck. Win-win!
•    Our wonderful veterinarian, who prescribes pills for Nicky’s skin, pills for Nicky’s joints, pills for Nicky’s liver and pills for Nicky’s seizures. (Other than that, Nicky’s perfectly healthy.)
•    Stir-fried vegetables, pasta and my famous sugar-free oatmeal cookies.
•    Eyes that can see and ears that can (partially) hear.
•    Bubble baths.
•    The Weather Channel. I’m obsessed.
Julie R. Smith, who is also thankful for newspapers and the people who read them, can be reached at widdleswife@aol.com.