Gratitude

Most of us are making New Year’s Resolutions: lose weight, eat right, organize the basement, practice the piano for fifteen minutes per day…that kind of thing. As of this morning, I have a different suggestion, one for which I cannot take credit. It’s the resolution of a friend with whom John and I spent New Year’s Eve; a simple idea, doable at any moment and without an outlay of time or real energy: gratitude. This friend resolves to be grateful for the blessings of his life. I was half-asleep on the couch by ten o’clock Saturday night. I vaguely recall lifting my head now and then to add a comment, probably puzzling, to the conversation, so I didn’t think much about his resolution until the next morning.

I was opening the Christmas cards I’ve gotten from friends over the last few weeks — the family letters, notes and photos from people who step into my life now only in this fleeting way, but invest the moment with an ample memory of past years. One of these friends is Margaret. Margaret is in her eighties, and we met in Ireland a while ago. I was living alone in a high-ceilinged house with gothic windows overlooking the Loch Corrib, which opens like a huge gray hand to the sea at Galway. I couldn’t make the central heat work; I burned turf in the fireplaces during the wet cold months I was there. And Margaret and I sometimes sat in front of the fire, eating pastries, and reading our poems to each other, as rain spattered against the panes and puddled on the stone terrace beneath the windows.

Poems are intimate. They allow a look, albeit cryptic, at a deep self, and I grew to love and admire Margaret. Her poems made me think of lace — intricately joined words, shaped by her understanding of the world into wise artful patterns. Her Christmas card this year reminds me of the love I feel for her and also speaks to the power of resolving to be grateful — to focus willfully on the good. I’ll share a paragraph of her letter to me; I’m certain she will not mind:

“…I continue to enjoy life here. Two months ago my sight got quickly worse. The consultant put down the axe and ordered me to stop driving, as of that day. He was right, of course. You can’t have traffic disappearing into a blank spot!! The day before he saw me, I drove to Clifden and on to Roundtree. The sun shone (a rarity this year!) and the colours were magical. I stored them all in my head, to take out and see any time when I cannot drive there. I wrote a funny poem called ‘New Look’ describing the different way things look…”

We think automatically of exercising our bodies, especially as a new year rolls around. How many of us realize the strength that comes from steadily exercising control of our thoughts? An attitude like Margaret’s does not come easily. It comes from years of self-discipline, of training her mind to focus on the positive. No doubt she grieves the loss of her sight, but she’s doing admirable battle with the demon the that grief.

I resolve this year, in addition to eating right, exercising and practicing the piano for fifteen (15) minutes a day, But to be more like Margaret, I’ll practice being grateful