I’ve started this post like 8 times. Originally it was going to be about Thanksgiving and Gratitude - or lack thereof. I’ve had a REALLY hard time feeling grateful this year, even though all of my family is healthy and, for the most part, happy. For the most part.

I haven’t felt grateful even though I have some of the best friends around me that anyone could ask for - friends who go above and beyond. Friends who deliver an ENTIRE toolbox of tools to my doorstep with a giant red bow when I put out a BOLO for a pipe wrench in the middle of a minor plumbing emergency (I am now the proud owner of a pipe wrench, if you need to borrow one. THANKS CRYSTAL!).

I haven’t felt grateful even though I have stayed gainfully employed, plus some this year, unlike so many people I know, and I have been able to take care of some significant financial obstacles for me and my kids. My cousin says that people like us who have actually done well during the pandemic because our jobs are conducive to working from home or our workload and demand has increased are “COVID carpetbaggers.” She’s not wrong, and I should feel so blessed that I have not been laid off or lost my business or struggled to pay my bills.

I haven’t felt grateful even though I have amazing kids who definitely plug the bathtub with gaggable hair monsters but make up for it with their robust humor, cute dogs that they share with me and the way their four unique perspectives add texture and depth to my life. And the beautiful Pendleton Bath Towels they gave me for Christmas which will be hidden in my room so they can’t touch them.

I haven’t felt grateful even though I have a house that stays mostly warm, plumbing that works a majority of the time (once hair monsters are removed) and the resources to keep it all going. Or a car that I love and is reliable and dresses up to be a really adorable reindeer. Or dogs that are ridiculous and make everything better at the end of the day, or the beginning, or in the middle when things get a little rough.

I haven’t felt grateful, and that makes me feel guilty. So to alleviate my guilt I do what all self-respecting Christian Homeschool kids do: I 4R gratitude. If you aren’t familiar with what the 4R process is, I probably wrote a blog about it a long time ago, but it’s basically breaking down a word by definition and background: Research, Reasoning, Relating and Recording, all in a biblical context, of course. I left the bible out of my 4R on this go-round, except for the residual knowledge that feeds into my reasoning and relating even against my will (anyone who says memorization as a learning tool doesn’t work is full of crap).

Turns out that the definition of gratitude in Webster’s 1828 Dictionary (which according to Christian Homeschoolers is the only viable resource of it’s kind) reads thusly:

GRAT'ITUDE, noun [Latin gratitudo, from gratus, pleasing. See Grace.]

“An emotion of the heart, excited by a favor or benefit received; a sentiment of kindness or good will towards a benefactor; thankfulness. gratitude is an agreeable emotion, consisting in or accompanied with good will to a benefactor, and a disposition to make a suitable return of benefits or services, or when no return can be made, with a desire to see the benefactor prosperous and happy. gratitude is a virtue of the highest excellence, as it implies a feeling and generous heart, and a proper sense of duty.”

“Consisting in or accompanied with good will to a benefactor… make a suitable return of benefits or services…”

My guilt over not feeling the heart-emotion was alleviated by the knowledge that gratitude can be lived, can be demonstrated, even when we aren’t feeling it.

To deny the mental health impact of the pandemic and the politics of this year would be ludicrous. Maybe there are others like me who aren’t feeling grateful. Who are feeling the strain of so many right/wrong choices and the confusion of changing information, misinformation and straight up propaganda. But when I look around, I see everyone around me living gratitude. People digging deep even through their frustration to support the small businesses that are dying in the stranglehold of this pandemic. The friend that left the tool box has probably had one of the hardest years of her life, fighting a devastating war with cancer that has wrecked her physically, but she acted out gratitude. This is us, we’re better than politics and pandemics. Hell, we’re better than cancer.

If there’s anything to be grateful for in 2020, it’s the chance we’ve all had to see each other through the new lens of critical necessity. We’ve had to distill our social circles down to the people who matter most. We’ve had to eliminate superfluous activities and decide whether and where we’ve lost any value in our lives. We’ve had to make hard choices about our value systems that sometimes don’t align with Governor’s Edicts and CDC Recommendations. We’ve had to determine our own Greater Good and the cost it might require. For some of us that’s isolation and for some of us it’s protesting. For some of us it’s somewhere in the middle and knowing that one holiday together might be the only one we get. We’ve all had to decide where the line is between living and survival. What level of risk is worth giving up all quality of life, and why, and for whom? On one hand I have never seen more division, or more hate. I been helpless as people I love cut me out of their lives because I have a different political persuasion. I have been called racist, bigot and hateful, by family members that I love. But on the other hand, in the closest circles, I have seen more selfless sacrifice, more understanding and more grace than ever before - sometimes our real family turns out to be the one we choose, not just the one we share genetic code with.

Watching us form our tribes (which is a survival tactic for the Animal known as Human) is telling. There are sad moments as lines are drawn and friends block us on Facebook. Sure, it’s painful when my cousin calls me a piece of sh*t, but we’re learning who we are and where we belong, and we’re living gratitude where it really matters.

2020 hasn’t been the best year, but if I’m honest, I think it’s about to get even worse. We’re not done with this virus. More people will die. More people will hate each other as this election debacle unfurls. More accusations will fly and people will find their tribes and build their fortresses, on Parler and in picket lines, in tabernacles and Twitter feeds, and that’s ok. It’s the Fourth Turning and we’ve got a ways to go, so buckle up.

Find your tribe. Live your gratitude. Make a suitable return to your benefactors, whomever they may be. It’s ok if we don’t FEEL it, we can still be it. We’ve got the tools (lemme know if you need to borrow some!).