AN ATTITUDE  OF GRATITUDE

I don’t know when or where I first heard the phrase, “an attitude of gratitude.” It was from somewhere, perhaps from someone on an audio cassette tape. Or maybe it was on a bumper sticker. Wherever, whenever, however, I don’t remember. Well, it was catchy and it caught me.

I look at my life and see all the gifts and graces that I have received: family, friends, health, fun, faith, and a whole photo album of great memories stored somewhere in the back room of my mind. I’ve been blessed and at times I say, “Thank you, God!”

Yet, I step back in this month that features Thanksgiving and I wonder: Do I have an attitude of gratitude? Do I take the time to really appreciate all the gifts that God and so many others have given me? I’m always rushing. And it seems to me that I’m must be missing so much in this rush of trying not to miss anything.

I think of Chesterton’s short poem, his short night prayer called, “Evening”:

          “Here dies another day

           during which I have had

           eyes, ears, hands,

           and the great world round me;

           and with tomorrow begins another.

           Why am I allowed two?”

Two? O my God, I’ll be 52 this month and that means I’ve had almost 19,000 days of life so far.

So my prayer this Thanksgiving will be: “Thank you, God.” And then I’ll add a prayer of sorrow: “Oh my God, I’m sorry for being so unconscious on so many days.”

When I step back now to think about it, so many days seem blank - a blur. They disappeared - without any memories and any proof that I was anywhere or I did anything of service for anyone that day.

So now I better add a further prayer, “Lord, I’m not ready to make an account of my stewardship. I need more time: time to wake up, time to shape up. So Lord, please give me more time. In fact, what I would really love to have is 20 more years of days.” (Cf. Luke 16:2; Luke 13:6-9.)

And then I laugh, because I know that if I make it till I’m  72 - the year will be 2011 - I’ll probably be asking once again for even more days of life.

WIGGLING MY TOES

I think of a 77 year old man I met somewhere in my travels. He taught me a great morning prayer, “I wake up. I just lay there for a moment and then I wiggle my toes. If they move, then I say, `Thank you, Lord, for one more day of life.’”

Isn’t that a great attitude? As I think back about him, I would certainly classify him as someone with an attitude of gratitude. Two years after I met him, his wife died. A year latter he married again. He is still living and still very much alive, wiggling his toes each morning and walking around each day, bringing joy to people that he meets. I would not mind having breakfast with him every morning. He seemed like the type of person who would be quite alive from the first moment of each new day.

ON BEING A MORNING PERSON

Yes, I like morning people. I am one myself. I get up every morning at 6:30 and have the luxury of being able to walk a half-mile to the Hudson River - all downhill. I walk to the water’s edge, bend down and put my hand in the water. It’s  quite a Holy Water font. I then make the sign of the cross and having learned from the old man who wiggles his toes each morning, I  too thank the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit for the gift of another day.

Then facing the east, I stretch out my arms and say out loud, “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen.”

Then I climb back uphill and arrive home with a mile walk under my toes - and ready for a nice refreshing shower.

Isn’t that a great way of beginning a new day? However, once snow arrives, I have to change my pattern. Most winter mornings I stay indoors. Fortunately, I live in a big building with four sets of stairs and four floors. So I have come up with a neat routine of climbing one set of stairs to the fourth floor, walking the length of the building and going down another set of stairs to the basement, walking the length of the building and going up to the top again. I do that five times. Let me tell you, it’s much tougher than a walk to the river. And it has produced a different morning prayer - sometimes said with grunts. Naturally, I long for the spring and the great outdoors and a morning walk to the river.

How do you begin your day? Wiggle your toes? Cup of coffee? A long shower? A long walk? Running? Prayers? Exercises? Turning on the radio to get any late breaking news from around the world? Reading the paper?

Various people have told me that they pray best in the morning with a cup of coffee - sitting alone at the kitchen table with their bible or prayer book or sitting in a favorite chair near a window.

What’s your morning attitude? Is it an attitude of gratitude for the gift of one more day of life? How do you begin your day? Do you have a personal morning prayer? Be original. Be creative. Surprise yourself and surprise God with your own words, your own chant, your own gestures, your own recital of gratitude for the gift of a each brand new day of life.

AM NOT A MORNING PERSON

Or maybe you’re not a morning person. Maybe your best friend in the morning is a snooze alarm. 10 more minutes. Just give me 10 more minutes. And then it’s rush or crawl, but almost unconsciously, trying to get to where you got to get, but reluctantly, every morning.

Living in a community with 15 other people, I get a good chance to see all kinds of different personality types and how they react to the morning. Some avoid breakfast with others like the plague. I usually arrive with six of seven others after common morning prayers. I sense that some people see where we morning people sit and then they sit as far away as possible. Their face seems to be saying, “Oh my God, shut him up. Where is there a dark corner where I can sit and eat quietly?”

I used to be harsh in my judgment of people who claimed that they do not function till after 10:30 A.M.. Hopefully, I’m getting to be a kinder and gentler person in my old age.

Yet, I still think that “non-morning persons” are missing out on some of the best hours of the day. I go by the old sayings: “The morning hours have their hands filled with  gold.” “It’s the early bird that catches the worm.”

I think people who constantly burn their candle on both ends are crazy, but I too was young once. A young friend of mine, Mary Jo, used to go dancing every night. Every morning on her way to work she used to stop in for a cup of coffee in the place where I worked. After hearing her tales from the night before, usually getting home on weekday nights around 1:00 A.M., I’d say, “Mary Jo, how did you get out of the bed this morning?” And she would always answer, “Slowly.”

Thinking about it, I’m not really fair on “non-morning people”. I don’t allow people to be different, to have different biological clocks than me. I’m self-centered. I block out that on most afternoons I bottom out after lunch till about 2:00 o’clock. And then I really don’t get energized till about 2:30. I’m a morning and a night person and not an early afternoon person. I’m made for Italy or Spain where they have the smart idea of a good siesta every afternoon.

MAKE MY ATTITUDE

What makes your day? What makes an attitude?

I sense that one’s attitude makes all the difference in the world whether one is happy or sad, positive or negative, energized or drained. Going to bed at 9:00 P.M or 1:00 A.M. might make a difference, but I think it’s deeper than that.

Some people use the word “attitude” in the negative sense only. I think that the word “attitude” means one’s basic outlook or way of looking at life. The dictionary says that attitude means just that: one’s way of thinking, the way I lean, my basic tendency, my inclination.

We know each other. We know our each other’s inclinations and ways of thinking. We know the kind of atmosphere that different people bring into whatever room enter. We know that people are like the weather. Some people have a sunny, bright blue disposition and some people are like dull, moody rainy days. When you are with Jane, you feel that everything is bright and upbeat; when you are with Joan, you feel like you are under a cloud and that she is dark and damp inside. She seems to be dwelling in her cellar instead of relaxing on her back porch.

But that’s other people. I would think that the reader of a magazine article is called upon to look at oneself. Do I incline to be negative or positive? Am I an optimist or a pessimist? What’s my weather report about myself? What kind of a person am I: warm and sunny, or cold, frigid, and stormy? Am I a cool breeze or am I full of hot air? Am I grateful or ungrateful?

GRATITUDE: ALL IS GIFT

I would think that a person who has an attitude of gratitude is someone who sees that all is gift. Well, not all the time, but most of the time. We all have our tides. We have our seasons. We have our winters of discontent. But in general, I would think that a person who has an attitude of gratitude is someone who would see life in a certain way.

So I sat back and began to jot down a description of a grateful person. The result is the following Thanksgiving shopping list before the Christmas rush.

A grateful person is someone whose basic weather pattern would be: all is gift, all is from God.

A grateful person is someone who enjoys games with friends, likes to win, but doesn’t come apart if they lose at bridge or “Uno” or chess or “Trivia Pursuit”.

A grateful person is someone who loves zoos and cartoons, salad and desert, birds and flowers by name, and the great variety of people one can see on the New York Subway or in Toronto or in Disneyland.

A grateful person is someone who stops to notice the scarlet, deep red or maroon color of cranberry sauce and the fascinating yellow rows of corn on the cob before they eat it.

A grateful person is someone who loves real mashed potatoes and turkey and cries tears of joy on Thanksgiving when they see that night on television many homeless people also getting a great Thanksgiving dinner because of volunteers. And they realize that they too are being called to volunteer.

A grateful person is someone who hasn’t got an over abundance of “have to’s” in their life.

A grateful person is someone who doesn’t see in general, but sees specifics. They don’t see dogs and trees and humans. They see this fluffy dog named “Polly” or that Japanese maple tree, the one off to the side on the front lawn of the local library, and this old lady next to them in church who is wheezing and they ask her how’s she doing at the sign of peace.

A grateful person is someone who can still enjoy ice cream as much as their grandchildren, when they take them out for a day at the mall or the park.

A grateful person is someone whose who isn’t a griper, a sniper, a nitpicker, a taker, a bumper, a sneak, a back stabber, an alligator, or a pit bull.

A grateful person is someone who enjoys the rye bread and doesn’t sit there whispering inwardly, “I should have  taken the pumpernickel.”

A grateful person is someone who wakes up every morning or sometime in the day, wiggles their toes, and thanks God for the gift of this new day of life with its many specific wonders.

Thank you for listening. Happy Thanksgiving.

Andy Costello, CSSR

U.S. Catholic,

November 1991