Thanksgiving

Today on this day of Thanksgiving in the United States I wanted to share what I am thankful for.<br />n<br />nAs with the first Thanksgiving I am thankful for the bountiful harvest the land has bestowed upon me. I work hard at being a good steward of the land and it has rewarded me in turn. Even though it turned out to be a dry year the good Lord seem fit to make it a good year and I am grateful.<br />n<br />nI am thankful for my wife and children. They stand beside me in my troubles and celebrate with me in the good times. Without them I would not be whom I am today and my life would seem very empty as it was before the blessing of their presence in my life was bestowed upon me.<br />n<br />nI am thankful for the rest of my family and the blessings it gives me. My mother, father, sister, brother, aunts, uncles, and all the others in my extended family. These people in the past and even today support and guide me with their advice and most support me with there love too. You know there is an old saying that you can choose your friends but you are stuck with your relatives. As with all families this is true for me too, but even those who I would rather not admit to being related to have helped me in making me who I am.<br />n<br />nI am thankful for my friends here at my blog and those who don't understand my blog. I will admit I don't trust people very easily and because of that do not have many friends, but those that I have I would trust with my life. These people yield valuable advice by there words and deeds that I can use as a compass in my life.<br />n<br />nI am thankful for the intelligence and understanding to realize that even the things that have happened in the past year that are painful and bad can be accepted and folded into my soul to make me a better person. These bad things, whether they be an act of nature or a quirk of fate, have caused me to look deep in my soul and search and find the strength to lift my spirit, and those around me, to step forward and say to the world "You Will Not Defeat Me, I Am Strong Enough To Handle This."<br />n<br />nLast but not least I am thankful for natural beauty that surrounds me on this earth. Whether it's the beauty of a newborn baby or the beauty of a perfect sunset I am thankful to the Lord that he has blessed me with the soul to see his beauty and marvel at it. These beautiful things are not always easy to see through the clouds of our everyday lives but what better thing is there than to look for them and marvel at them.<br />n<br />nThese are some of the things I am thankful for. I hope anyone reading this can relate to some of these things and add there own. I also wish you the best on this day and every day and that many thanks will fill your life with joy. You have but to open your heart to see them.<br />n<br />nI awoke this morning with a devout thanksgiving for my friends, the old and the new. Shall I not call God the Beautiful, who daily showeth himself to me in his gifts? Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)