Week of Thanks - Day Five

I would like to express fervent gratitude for the people who came out on Black Friday and bought cars from my husband, especially the ones who came with $33,000 in cash. Yes, cash.

With so many years of experience in the car business, my husband -- like many other salesmen -- has learned to recognize the true buyers from the casual shoppers or wishers and dreamers. Men by themselves? Depends. Salesmen look for wedding rings on men's fingers. If the man is wearing a wedding ring but is at the dealership by himself, he's most likely a wisher and dreamer who's there to look at a new Camaro and tell anyone who will listen about the Z-28 he bought with the money he saved up by mowing lawns from birth to seventeen years old.

But a man who is there with his wife? He is a serious buyer. A couple of those couples came out yesterday and helped turn a really sucky and scary month into a slightly less stomach-churning period for us. One cute couple called their daughter, a freshman at Butler, to come look at the car before they made their decision: The girl arrived, said she loved it, and mom and dad got out the checkbook. I thought that was really sweet and funny.

What was particularly nice about the people my husband worked with yesterday is that both couples, he said, were lovely people. Easy to work with. Pleasant and kind. Friendly. There are so many of the other sort, he says, that you tend to remember the ones who were great.

Here's hoping for a few more magnanimous folks to be grateful for before the month ends on Monday. Baby needs a new pair of shoes. And Mommy needs to buy groceries for Christmas dinner. And for all the other days in December that aren't Christmas. We're in the clutch here, people. Go buy a Chevy from my husband, the Prince of Salesmen and make me even more thankful than I am right now.

Black Friday has not traditionally been a day when there are lots of car sales. For the past thirteen years that my husband has been selling cars, it's mostly been a day when the salesmen sit in the showroom next to the phones that are not ringing, eating the pralines that someone's wife sent in and working crossword puzzles as they scan the lot. Who ever would have guessed that there would be serious car buyers out on this particular day in this particular economy?

For that, all levity aside, I am truly grateful.

Week of Thanks - Day Four

Today I am giving thanks for books. Books on the shelves and books on the table tops; books on the staircase, books in the public library, books in book stores and at Amazon....my love affair with books has been going on since I was a toddler staggering up to various adult relatives with a pile of Dr. Seuss books clutched in my arms and one demand upon my baby lips: "Wead to me."

My mother taught me how to read when I was four, not because she was convinced I was some kind of genius (I wasn't), but because I kept pestering her to just explain to me, all these words. I don't know how long it took her, but I can remember the feeling of triumph I had when I opened some little book and realized that all those black squiggles had meaning: I could look at C-A-T and a picture of my grandma's cat, Fluff, leapt into my mind.

I have had a love affair with books ever since then. When I go to the library, it isn't just to get a book or two - it's more like twelve or twenty. It's been like that since I was a kid and discovered From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and A Wrinkle in Time. Also the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books, which I still think are the funniest and smartest children's books I've ever read. And what girl hasn't sat and wept over Sara Crewe or Francie Dolan?

Although I do read some non-fiction, reading has always primarily been a way of escape for me. Fiction is my favorite, and I'll read just about anything, although I find romance novels hard to stomach. There's just something about the love affairs of fictional characters that just leaves me cold, especially the affair in a book that I picked up entirely by accident where the author began describing someone's "member," and it was pretty clear that the author wasn't referring to an associate in a country club or a PTA group or a fraternity. Ish.

If I get to the point where I'm near the end of my library book and I know that there are no others in my bag, I start feeling a little uneasy. Likewise, nothing makes me feel better than knowing that there is a big stack of fat books waiting for me up in my room.

Book. Books and books and books. I'm thankful for all the good ones I've come across in my life, and thankful for all the ones I haven't read yet. Books that other people have raved about (well, except for that one) and books that I've been able to share with others.

Books have been good friends to me.

Week of Thanks - Day Three

My greatest gratitude today goes to my husband, a person for whom I am thankful every single day, even though he wears white socks with sandals against my fervently expressed wishes, even though he doesn't like popcorn.

This month has been an awful month for car sales, which figures, since next month is Christmas. Back in the good old days, we knew that November would be rocky, so we did this thing, this amazing thing that really helped us out a lot: We put a whole bunch of money in the bank back in June, July and August so that when November came along, we could just pay all our bills out of that savings account and use whatever amount he earned in commission to buy Christmas gifts and the like. But those days? They are gone with the wind, Miss Scarlett.

This morning, my husband came upstairs, smelling of fresh clothes and soap and toothpaste, and looked at me, where I was admittedly still yawning in the bed, having not yet summoned the energy to get up on a cool, rainy morning. "Scoot over," he said.

I obligingly scooted and he climbed in under the covers next to me. We stayed there face to face for a moment, our noses practically touching. "You know," he said, "when we met, I thought it was so great that you were a teacher, because I knew you'd always have steady work that paid well, with insurance and everything. I figured that with what I made -- and I planned to do well -- we'd have a pretty decent life, with a nice house, cars, money in the bank...."

"We do have a pretty decent life," I said stoutly.

"Not really what I thought it would be," he said ruefully. "But when the kids came along, I just couldn't see you working. You know, outside the home. I wanted to be able to shoulder the whole deal. I was proud that I could do that, you know? The men in my family, they've always been the kind who saw it as a point of honor that their wives didn't have to work unless they just wanted to."

"I know," I said. "And you do a great job, you really do. We always squeeze by, no matter what. And the recession won't last forever."

"I hope not. God, I pray not," he sighed. "I'd sure like to think that someday we'll look back on this whole one income life with our decision to home school the girls and say, 'Geeez, that was pretty frikken scary during that recession, but we made it. We always made it, no matter what."

"Well, you know that's how our great-great-grandparents got through the Great Depression. They made it and we will, too." I smoothed out a worried line between his eyes. "I wonder if I'll end up being one of those ladies who's saved a drawer full of string or thumbtacks or something?"

"If you're going to save something crazy, then I'd prefer it if you'd save something useful, like stamps or safety pins," he said, flinging back the bedcovers and getting out of the bed. He leaned over and smooched me on the forehead. "Love you. Call me. What's for dinner?"

"Velveeta Shells and Cheese."

"Are you TRYING to kill me?"

"Look, I've already had this same discussion with your kids. You are going to be FEASTING on Thursday, so I think you can manage with macaroni and cheese on Wednesday. Besides, I have a bunch of Thanksgiving cooking to do and I don't want to have to put together a big dinner on top of all that."

"Macaroni and cheese is just basic nourishment, kid food," he grumbled.

"I told the girls that if they didn't quit complaining, I wasn't going to cook the pasta before I served it," I warned.

"Whatever," he sighed. "Well, anyway, talk to you later."

He went out of the room, shutting the door quietly behind him, mindful of the sleeping girls, and went off to slay some dragons.

Week of Thanks - Day Two

Today, I am really thankful for the opportunity that my family has to just sit down after dinner in the evenings and watch television together, laughing, talking, arguing and enjoying one another's company. We're getting ready to watch So You Think You Can Dance as I type this post; it's a chilly night with the rain splashing down on the street outside the living room windows, the perfect cozy night for us three girls to pile onto the couch with the fleece throw blankets, the squooshy pillows and the dogs while Dad reigns supreme in his big recliner with a beer in one hand and the remote in the other.

It's so much fun, our favorite way to bond as a family, and whoops! Meelyn and Aisling just finished with the dishes and my husband has the show all cued up on the DVR, so I'd better grab my tea and go get settled.

Love the lovely family.

Week of Thanks - Day One

I am kind of a naturally grumpy person, so I don't think that gratitude -- thankfulness -- is something that comes to me easily. Sometimes I have to make myself think, "You should be thankful for this; you have been blessed by [add specific situation/name of person]." Not a very charming thing to admit.

It particularly bothers me that right now, with our U.S. economy in such turmoil, I have an extra hard time feeling gratitude, mostly because it seems that everything is so difficult. I get tired of not having money, of constantly worrying about bills and making sure my husband has some new boots before snow falls because his old boots are about five years old and have holes in the soles, and are we going to have to have a pre-emptive strike on the money my parents and grandparents give us for Christmas so that we can pay the utilities and the gas bill....it's just wearing. I feel like all this has changed me into a different kind of person, one who is warier and less hopeful and much less convinced that the future will be bright. Ugh.

But there are blessings that I definitely recognize. I'm not a total curmudgeon, after all. And the thing I feel the most gratitude for on this week leading up to Thanksgiving is the privilege of being Catholic. Knowing Jesus in the depth and breadth of His Church -- spiritually and historically -- has changed my entire life. Despite my many flaws and failings, I have loved Jesus since I was a child and it has been my greatest joy to be able to become closer to Him in the sacraments, the birthright of Christians everywhere.

"Better one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere."

-Psalm 84:10