What I’m Thankful For

Julie-Jo sort of inspired me to write this blog entry with her email yesterday about writing blog entries about simple aspects of our day to day lives. This idea about what we are thankful for really struck me for some reason, and it’s definitely appropriate since Thanksgiving is quickly approaching.

First and foremost, I would like to thank the few friends I have in my life that have truly been there for me, accept me as I am and don’t try to change me. I am thankful to those who make an effort to understand me and to those who care for me and make me feel appreciated. I say few, because I have a lot of people in my life that I would consider friends, but too many of them act in ways that suggest that they are more concerned about how events play out in their lives than they are concerned how they play out in mine. Too many of them put themselves in the center of the equation when there’s a problem, and, again, I’m thankful for those who don’t, who basically love me, because I am who I am, not because they see aspects that can be improved.

Secondly, I am thankful to have a home to return to when I’m not in school. I know that there are people out there who don’t have that. In fact, one of my friends was just telling me the other day that she knows someone who doesn’t really have a place to go, so he stays with her. I’m thankful to be someone who has a home and thus does have a place to go. My family and I, most notably my parents and I, have not always gotten along, but it seems as if that isn’t really a problem anymore since I have started school. For the most part, going home (which is rare, making it that much more special; I’ve only gone home twice so far since I got here in August) is a nice, relaxing getaway from college life, which is very often incredibly stressful. On that note, I’m thankful to have a younger brother who I get along with really well. When we were younger, anyone would have said that the day we got along would have been the same day pigs flew. Now that we’re older though, it’s different. Now we’re friends, if you want to put it that way.

Next, I would have to say that I am thankful to be able to be here, fulfilling my dreams and receiving a college education. The road that lead me to where I am today was an incredibly long and difficult one. There were, in fact, times that I felt very dubious about the matter and began to think that maybe I wasn’t going to make it. Some people even told me that I wasn’t going to make it, and here I am, having proved them wrong and having proved myself wrong.

I am thankful for music. I cannot possibly write a blog entry about what I’m thankful for without mentioning music. As of now, I don’t play anything, but I want to learn piano. Unfortunately, opportunity never presented itself, or if it did, it fell short. One time, for example, I made plans with someone to give me lessons. My parents were even going to pay her, but she never called me. I thought that that would be different in college, but so far, it has proven to be just as difficult. I wanted to take piano lessons but was told that I’d have to take Class Piano first, so I figured I’d take that second semester, but I tried registering for it, and there are no seats available, so I’m going to be at least a junior before I can begin taking lessons, and that’s assuming that I can register for the class the first semester of my sophomore year before all the seats are taken yet again. Anyway, I’m getting off topic here. I am thankful for music in general. Music often changes my mood, or even more often, it intensifies a feeling I am already experiencing, which oddly enough, makes the feelings easier to cope with and eventually either accept or put behind me. Movies and other forms of entertainment are stories that are created by someone based on fictitious ideas that that person has, but music comes directly from the heart and from the artist’s feelings and is real in that sense.

Lastly, I have to mention literature as being something I’m thankful for. My love and appreciation for it was ultimately the main reason why I decided that I want to teach English literature to high school students. I want to share my love for it and hope to inspire young people with it the way so much of it has inspired me. I also hope to turn more young people into readers. I personally think that there are too many who don’t read enough or maybe don’t even read at all, and I also think that more learning is going to be accomplished just by picking up a book than by sitting in a classroom. I remember my mother telling me once (in fact, I think my father has told me this as well) that you don’t learn from fiction writing, and I was appalled by the statement because of my vehement disagreement with it. Even by reading a fictitious work, you learn a great deal about the world, human emotion, the sociology of human nature, and in some cases, you even learn about history. I can confidently say that most of what I know now was learned from fictional literature. I know that as a fact. It may be true that, for me anyway, it provides an escape from reality, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t learn anything from it.

I’m sure there are a lot of additional things I am thankful for. For example, I’m obviously thankful to be an American and thus have the right to vote and to be entitled to freedom of speech, etc. I’m obviously thankful to be alive. I’m also thankful for peanut butter, the television series LOST and for Italian food. However, I think that I really touched upon the important aspects of my life that I am really thankful for.