Rhonda Reese Purtee

#AdventPhotos – Thanks
I have an amazing family, but out of everyone who lives, or has lived in our home over the years, no one matches Louis Bichon for simple, unfailing gratitude. He’s over 12 years old now, getting stiff joints, going blind, and constantly plagued with allergies and a touchy digestive system. He has eaten the exact same weight control food twice a day, every day for the past 11 years, and every time I dump it in his bowl, he’s just as happy as if it were the first time he were tasting it. Oddly, my family seems somehow less grateful for yet another bowl of Cherrios. Go figure. Of course, I’m just as guilty. I got an fancy-shmancy automatic tea brewer last Christmas that I was thrilled to get. I’m a tea addict and this thing has all the bells and whistles. As I was using it earlier today I realized that in the period of a few months I had moved from being appreciative of this new luxury, to it being just another invisible tool that I take for granted. I don’t know why we’re so prone to move past thankfulness, but I’m going to try to be more like Louis and stay in the gratitude zone. It’s not my right to live in a country that affords me, and every other citizen a level of freedom that is desired around the world, it’s a blessing and I want to be thankful for it. I didn’t do a single thing to earn the family I have, countless others would give every possession they have to know the kind of love and security I have always known, I want to be thankful every day for that gift. Every time I am up at my doctors in Cleveland, I see good people who would love to trade their health issues for mine. I could not have ever worked my way to a point of deserving the grace that God has lavished onto my life, I want to live in a place of humble gratitude. Not taking for granted, not expecting more, but always appreciative of whatever I find residing in my “right now.”