The Obligatory Thanksgiving Post

Another year is coming to a close and frankly, I'll be all too grateful to see the backside of 2009...but until that fateful hour on December 31st, we still have the chaos that has become the American holiday season. To kick it off this year, I noticed that several of our neighbors had no sooner taken down their ridiculous inflatable pumpkins and seizure inducing graveyards (with sound! and lights!!) than they put up...Christmas.

Bloody, bloody Christmas.

Now, I have nothing against Christmas. It's actually my favorite holiday when stripped of it's consumerism. I love sipping a glass of wine in the soft glow of a Christmas tree, listening to the Christmas recordings I grew up with - those of the 1940's and '50's - and wondering if there will be snow for Santa's sleigh this year.

But dammit, it's not yet Thanksgiving and I've been staring out of our office space window each night at Christmas lights all up and down this street. [facepalm]

So, in honor of Thanksgiving, I am listing the things I will be thankful come Thursday, the day after we embark on a 6 hour road trip to see my parents with a 19.5 month old in the back seat of the car, who has developed a new found love for The Adicts, How Sad (but she thinks they're singing "outside", not "how sad" and it is now the..."Owsigh tong, Mama! Owsigh tong!!!") and we will have to hear that song for 6 hours OMG I AM NOT THANKFUL FOR THAT.

Ahem. I forgot myself for a moment there. So, without further ado, My Thankful For List:

• I will be thankful if we manage to make this trip both ways withOUT hitting a blizzard or snow storm in the central valley region on the Thruway.
• I will be thankful if I can convince A that Devo is really where it's at and throw my beloved Adicts discs out the window (yeah, I'm not high speed with teh MP3 thing yet...).
• I will be thankful that A does not scream and try to break free of her car seat for the duration of the ride....

What? Stop snarking already, Snarky McSnarkerson? Oooohh...a serious list? OK. SRS list is SRS. And now for some real thanks...

• I am thankful that I will be able to celebrate another Thanksgiving with a woman who served in WWII and a woman who married a WWII veteran - my great aunt and grandmother. The last of that generation...
• I am thankful that I have such a patient and loving man in my life; a wonderful father and someone who, once they really got to know me, didn't go running the other way. (He actually puts up with me. Amazing...)
• I am thankful for the love and friendship I have known, especially after my separation and subsequent crawling back return home to Boston, back when. My friends didn't laugh, point or say, "I told you so." They fed and sheltered me and gave me the chance to get back on my feet, a new lease on life and welcomed my love home with me.
• I am most thankful that our daughter has survived my parenting for this long and seems to actually be thriving in spite of it.
• I am thankful that I have a family to celebrate and be thankful with and for.

And you?