A mother of young children recently
shared this story with me about her favorite part of the day, and it certainly
wasn’t what I expected to hear. “When I strap both my kids in their carseats, I
close the door and walk to the driver’s seat, and that’s it, that’s what I try
to enjoy. Because everyone is safe and secure, and I get to walk those few
steps knowing that they’re okay, but really, really, enjoying the quiet.”
At first, I thought her story was
just about the saddest thing I’d ever heard. How long does it take her to walk
around that minivan – 15 seconds? And that’s it, this tiny moment, that’s her
highlight? This is just something that’s too small to be grateful for, I decided.
And then I thought again. I
wondered about myself on my grumpiest, crabbiest, most entitled-acting days, and
thought it was likely that I didn’t spend even one second being grateful, let
alone 15. I thought about how this young mother had managed to find the tiniest
moment of blessing in an otherwise raucously chaotic life.
On second thought, I realized, this
wasn’t a sad story after all. Once I knew that, it was clear I needed to find
my own moments of what might be called micro-gratitude--moments that seem so insignificant,
and pass by so quickly, that I had barely noticed them before.
This season, as trees have been
laid bare and the days have gotten darker, I’ve been trying to pay attention to
those slivers of sacredness that are right in front of my eyes. Instead of the
rote repetition of the headlining gratitude all-stars--family, friends, food,
blah, blah blah—I’ve tried to fix my eyes on split second wonders of
just-for-now blessings. It might be something as fleeting and mundane as lugging
a few more books to fill up the Little Free Library I received as a birthday
present in September. As I stack up the spy thrillers and chapter books and
knock-knock joke compendiums, I imagine the joy on the faces of people who will
revel in coming across just the title they needed most, without ever realized
it.
Or, as I walk along Minnehaha Parkway
on my way to errands or exercise class, I’ve been forcing myself to stop—a
full-on, no-fidgeting-allowed stop—to watch the creek, forcing myself to count
to ten. “Pay attention,” I tell myself. “It’s all going by as fast as this
water is passing, so spend ten seconds to take it in.”
If your family is of the sort
that’s inclined to go around the table and say what each member is thankful for
this holiday, I urge you to follow the lead of that young mom and split the
atom of gratitude to its finest possible point. Do it until you can come up
with the tiniest, most precious parcel: on the family’s newest member, the
crescent of an infant’s thumbnail; the one perfect spoonful of your mom’s most
delicious dish; the warmth of the dishwater on your hands when you volunteer to
be the one to clean up this year, no prodding needed.
All those milliseconds of
gratitude might not add up to any great insight for you this Thanksgiving, but
they might help you get a little closer to the truth: all we have is today, and
all we can be grateful for is what’s happening this very second, and that’s
reason enough.
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