Novembers Artsy Essay

My well loved friend Judi Heartsong host an Artsy Essay contest each month with themes and this month's theme goes well with the holiday of Thanksgiving:

Sharing the Gift of Thanks

If you could thank one person (someone you know or someone you have never met, living or dead) for one extraordinary thing that has mattered tremendously in your life, who would it be and what would you thank them for?

It would simply be impossible for me to not do an essay on this topic, impossible. Irresponsible. So I will do it against my better judgment and I will time the posting for the exact time that it shall make the deadline of the contest and posting that shan't interfere with tomorrow (November 30th)...and try to be creative enough to not break any boundaries either. Perhaps it won't be my best piece of writing but it will be my heart. Blog police be damned!


That said, here is my entry:


What does it mean to be thankful? To have a heart overflowing with gratitude that can not be contained with the flimsy walls of the soul? One must begin with a solid definition of thanks first:

thankful

One entry found.

thankful

Main Entry:

thank·ful

Pronunciation:

\ˈthaŋk-fəl\

Function:

adjective

Date:

before 12th century

1 : conscious of benefit received -for what we are about to receive make us truly thankful
2 : expressive of thanks -thankful service
3 : well pleased : glad was thankful that it didn't rain

— thank·ful·ness noun

Webster is good at breaking it down to the basic elements of the heart, to the starkness of it all.

For what we are about to receive makes us truly thankful.

We are well pleased.

We are expressive of thanks.

Man we are glad.


To be thankful then is to be happy in the core of one's very soul, to be filled up beyond filling.


If I could thank one person for something who would it be and why would I thank them?

Ah.

I am not only the glass the half full kind of woman but also a gee-aren't-ya-glad-they-didn't-get-out-the-Ritz-kinda-gal so when it comes to this November, and the dates that I normally mark in the fall, I can not begin to even fathom the swelling in my heart. The 25th of November marked ten years that my brain tumor has not reoccurred, that I have been granted life by my God. I celebrated by teaching Sunday School to first graders where I listened to a six year old girl tell me that God sings her to sleep at night, actually He sings her different songs each night so that she can get to know Him better. Honestly, I am the only one who remembered that the 25th was such a remarkable date and it was okay.

But I am not most thankful to that talented suregon, although he is a good man, there is another person to whom I am indebted. A woman.

Someone that I do not know and yet I know stories of and have seen pictures of, have probably heard the lilt of her voice though her children's laughter.

I have felt the graciousness of her unselfishness and will forever have the privilege of sharing something she loved more than herself. In October 2003 I almost died but instead of dying I became unable to have children of my own.

My husband and I know her story, we know bits and pieces of her pain and I am forever thankful that she is giving us pieces of her soul to raise for her today, officially.