On Gratitude

Not a day goes by where I don’t gain at least one thing to be grateful for. Often, a long ago memory of some sage advice or a day out in the woods with my grandfather comes back to the surface and something learned long ago; which didn’t seem relevant at the time now makes more sense.

In keeping with my tradition of refusing to be a sheep to the trends (no hashtags on any of my posts, making quiet anonymous donations instead of ‘hey, look at me’ videos etc.) I found the recent ‘gratitude challenge’ to be quite silly. Not to say it’s wrong of people to do it, it’s just such a way of life of mine to live gratitude that I feel it’s something people should do daily rather than wait for a social networking trend to do it for them.
So instead of being another one of the sheep and spending only five days expressing my gratitude, I’ll share with you a very small part of my continuously growing gratitude list.

I am grateful for the serenity of a lonely mountain trail.

Nothing brings me a more pure spiritual recharge than a day in the wild. Personally, I gain more spiritual clarity from being among God’s natural creation than I do in a man-made building. I am also grateful for the ability to choose the path that works for me and follow my own interpretation of god rather than feeling compelled and/or pressured to follow someone else’s interpretation.

I am grateful for Fender guitars.

Stevie Ray Vaughan. Little Wing. ‘Nuff said…

I am grateful for the white granite stones at Fort Rosecrans.

Since my first-born was three years old, I have taken my children there and we often leave tokens of gratitude at random graves, be it a piece of candy from Old Town for World War One veteran we’ve never met or a can of Mountain Dew for a kid half my age who lost his life in the War on Terror, which is in reality World War Three. Not a day goes by where I don’t think of their sacrifice, not a bundle of sage gets burned without a prayer of thanks for that sacrifice.

I am grateful for being a citizen of a nation that once had leaders.                                                                                                                                                                 

We’ve had no shortage of great leaders in our history. Sadly, this is not true for our day and age. Yet I still draw inspiration from knowing that men like Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt and George S. Patton once led this once-great nation.

I am grateful for Jack Murphy, Ray Kroc and Larry Lucchino.

They are the men who saved baseball in San Diego, each on their own occasions and in separate decades, no matter what official statements have said recently.

I am grateful for opportunity.

Michael Jordan, Babe Ruth and Bob Hope had no more opportunities than I have, nor did they have more than you do. If anyone tells you different, refusing to believe their lies is entirely up to you.

I am grateful for truth.

The phrase “the Truth will set you free” is kind of a cliché, and I avoid clichés like the mindless trends they often are. Yet through bad decisions made with a clouded mind and a bankrupt soul, I took my life to a place very far from Truth. In seeking the truth I have been able to create a better life. In finding the truth I have been able to break down the walls of my self-imposed Prison of Denial.

I am grateful for my unorthodox ‘college’ education.

At an age where many men are heading off to college, I was getting my education in the hunting camps and jobsites across the American Southwest. An invaluable period where I gained knowledge I would never have gained in a classroom.

I am grateful for the writers who have dared me to be great.

Stephen King has said ‘If you want to be a successful writer, you must write no less than two thousand words per day. If you’re not prepared to do that, don’t even bother.” Louis L’Amour has over three hundred million books printed and all of his books are still in print, over twenty-five years after he went on to the Big Roundup in the sky. He implored me to never stop reading; to never stop learning, it can all come to good use some day. Andy Andrews has opened my mind, heart and soul to concepts that were absolutely foreign to me just a few years ago; now they make up a big part of who I am today. Last but certainly not least, Nick Canepa has informed me, entertained me and inspired me ever since I delivered the Evening Tribune in the 1980’s. Most if not all of my blog entries show a lot of how his writing style has influenced my own, as with the previous three writers.

I am grateful for my family.

My immediate family numbers five, soon to be six. My extended family extends well beyond forty thousand. I am grateful for all of you. I cannot write more on this subject, because it’s a job that would never be complete. However, I can, will and do live my life in a consistent expression of that gratitude.

 So there you have it. No, I would not and could not do the “Gratitude Challenge” in the way everyone else is doing it, in large part because everyone else is doing it. I usually find that as reason not to do something. I need a better reason than that and come to think of it, these past three-plus years have found me living gratitude and showing it publicly rather than waiting it to become a trend. So instead of doing a “five day challenge”, I challenge you to compile your own never-ending Gratitude List. You’ll be grateful you did…