Green Oasis

I am grateful for…

1. … a helpful highway patrolman who stopped and lent me a lug wrench to change the flat tire that I had on the way to work.
2. … the color green.
3. … the opportunity to make choices.
4. … a good night’s rest.
5. … the opportunity to be a father.

You may not have noticed. In these posts, I have avoided the mention of negative aspects of the things I am grateful for. It is really easy to fall into the mode of “This thing over here is pretty crappy, but I’m grateful for it because…”. That seems contrary to what I’m trying to achieve: more openness to the good things in my life.

So, I try to never use the word “but” when expressing gratitude. Instead, I focus solely on the parts that I’m thankful for.

1. LDS Church, thank you for introducing me to many good people. There are worse ways to start out in life than being surrounded by people who try hard to do what they see as the right thing and who repeatedly emphasize how important it is to know the truth.
2. Thank you to my employer. I am grateful for the means to consistently put food in front of my family.
3. To my daughters, thank you for teaching me what it means to be a human being.
4. To the authors of Everything You Never Wanted Your Kids to Know About Sex, but Were Afraid They’d Ask, thank you for giving me a more reasoned, accepting view of my own sexual development. It’s good to know that I grew up rather typically. I’m sure my daughters will also have reason to thank you in years to come.
5. I am grateful for the chance to get good sleep. For this, I mostly have to thank myself. It’s up to me to make the most of the opportunities I have.

I am grateful for…

1. … the chance that I’ve had to get to know my wife.
2. … the renewed knowledge that sleep is important. I haven’t made sleep a priority this weekend, and it shows. I’m grateful that I’m aware enough of that to take correction.
3. … the chance that I have every day to take walks while at work.
4. … the relationship that I have with my daughters so far. May I continue to nurture it.
5. … my ability to learn new things.

Our consciousness vanishes in dreamless sleep every night. It’s such a familiar experience that we pay no attention to the annihilation of our sentience. I imagine we experience death as the dreamless sleep from which we never awake to notice that time has passed and the world has gone on without our awareness.

All the earth is a grave and nothing escapes it,
nothing is so perfect that it does not descend to its tomb.
Rivers, rivulets, fountains and waters flow,
but never return to their joyful beginnings;
anxiously they hasten on the vast realms of the rain god.
As they widen their banks, they also fashion the sad urn of their burial.

Filled are the bowels of the earth
with pestilential dust once flesh and bone,
once animate bodies of man who sat upon thrones,
decided cases, presided in council, commanded armies,
conquered provinces, possessed treasure, destroyed temples,
exulted in their pride, majesty, fortune, praise and power.

Vanished are these glories, just as the fearful smoke vanishes
that belches forth from the infernal fires of Popocatepetl.
Nothing recalls them but the written pate.

(A poem purportedly written by Nezahualcoyotl, King of Texcoco)