Thankfulness

The turkey is history, the pie scrumptious, stuffing was well - stuffed! We went, we ate, we relished! Our little bundle of our gratitude was sufficiently impressed with the spread to eat quite a bit and as a result has three new favorites to add to the growing list: cranberry sauce (whole Berry), lemon meringue pie and pumpkin pie!! She loved them all. It was a nice relaxing evening until it wasn't and we beat a hasty retreat and our Empress is sound asleep. That is more important than it might sound. Since the beginning of this whole daycare business our little one's sleep has become more and more disturbed, as a result Mommy's sleep and Daddy's sleep has become well, lacking frankly! Last night was a real mess... as a result our evening was cut a little short due to a sleep-deprived, major league tantrum of epic proportions. At grandmas to boot! Yuck! hence my early post and earlier arrival home! Well - she needed to get to bed anyway - but oh my was she loud and not at all understanding of my loving attempts to inhibit her climbing (on a chair next to an unstable table with a glass water pitcher on it). Oh well. It couldn't be helped. So we beat it out of there and here we are.

I think for the past few years I have taken the time to write the obligatory list of things I am grateful for. I am going to do something - but not quite what I usually write. Of course I AM still grateful for all those usual things.. health, hubby, family, friends, work and love and all that.

Don't think I won't mention that which I am MOST grateful for - of course, my daughter. You saw that coming right? I am quite grateful for the gift of her care. The amazing and humbling opportunity to love and nurture this child. I can't really explain how much a part of me she is now, I know she did not grow inside me but I can barely think that. She is so a part of the fabric of my life - all that I am and all I hope to be. She is the making of me truth be told. I know I had some accomplishments before she came along but they pale in comparison to any of the things I have accomplished since then. LOL. It is a hard job and no one can adequately prepare you for the sacrifices (which do not feel like sacrifices) or the ache you carry when you worry about how that child is doing when you are forced to leave them in someone Else's care. Or how you can look into that face that you love so much and see all the amazing possibilities and know in no uncertain terms the future is theirs in all its glory.

I am truly grateful for her. And of course for all the other blessings I hold in my hand. My DH - the ever patient and best daddy ever. My family - who although disappointed this weekend in our inability to join them on our annual Philly excursion - understand that I am just doing what good mommy does and I know they love me for it in spite of their disappointment. My friends - an eclectic group of the smartest, strongest, kindest and most beautiful women imaginable. Near or far - they are the true jewels of the earth.

No - I have a different gratitude this year. Every year actually. This year I have decided to be grateful for adversity. Mine, my daughter's and, well, everyone's. How would we know exactly what we are capable of if we are never tested? Truly, I have been tested. I will be again - but I think I finally understand that this is all part of gaining wisdom. There is no wisdom in a clear and straightm unhampered path. It is exactly those twists and turns, bumps and ditches that are integral in helping us to learn and achieve more than we dream we are capable. Certainly I had plenty of those and some more than once. I don't think I have ever been so convinced that they were necesary evils. Sure, there are some parts of the story I wish could have been left out - but then I wouldn't be who I am or how I am for that matter. Certainly - I think this will make me a more understanding mom, wife, sister, aunt, daughter in law, friend etc. I am more forgiving than I was formerly and I am also more honest with myself about the limitations of the human heart. There are also hidden benefits to having a so-called past - I always have something I can choose to talk about or not. Much of it I do not - which may surprise some of you that there could be anything left I have not said.. beleive me there is a lot!! Also - I have left behind some of the fear and shame that seemed to dog my every step. Perhaps in this there will be more than the healing I have been so thankful for. I feel ready to start things over somehow - perhaps a move is exactly what I need. I know I am ready for change = I thought it would be in the form of another child (I am still holding on to some hope that will be true) but I am thinking now that I am due for a sea change. That is a profound feeling - not exactly cut and run and not exactly stay and mold! I guess rolled up in all this a new level of understanding of all the forces that have led me to this place... all the ancestors and wrong turns that have culminated in the precise combination that mean me, my sister and my brother were born and lived to tell about it. For all those things I am profoundly grateful. That I have lived to tell the tale I am also grateful.