We are moving into the season of gratitude. Gratitude is not amiss in any season, but this is the season of communal gratitude — Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukah, Kwanzaa, Eid, welcoming the New Year. It’s a good time to stop and think about what we are grateful for, and to tally up our lives to see if there are more good things than bad in them.
I’m grateful for many things.
There is the usual gratitude for friends, family, health, enough to eat, a roof over my head.
I’m also grateful for medical advances: think how awful to be without anesthesia, antibiotics, vaccines, modern surgical techniques, diagnostic tools, and pain medications.
As much as I curse my computer and its spawn, I am grateful for technology. How amazing to be able to look up anything online, converse with people all over the world, send documents in seconds. Technology helps paralyzed people communicate, sends humans into space, and lets us play cool computer games!
I’m grateful that I live in the USA, where, despite setbacks and disappointments, we inch along the road toward our aspiration of justice for all.
And I’m grateful for this beautiful world of ours — with all of its oceans, mountains, deserts, forests, and so many other fascinating creatures we share it with.