Rant of appreciation
Things have changed and I’m loving it. Not too many years ago this thing called The Crash happened. You may have heard of it. I think it affected a couple of people beyond us also. Suffice it to say, we’ve crawled through that dark swamp into daylight — and it’s time to rant on about all I appreciate this Appreciation Day!
It’s best to start close to my heart:
Ohmyfuckinggod I love my wife and kid. I’m crazy silly loopy for them. AnkaSeti for her quietly funny ways. For her soft creative spark. For her loving tenderness. The Zonk for his pre-teen surprises. For his caring nonchalance. For his raucously aggressive sense of when it’s right to have a good time. (Always 🙂
Our two dogguses too. The beast of a German Shepherd, the dainty toenail-tapping Viszla.
15 years ago pocket computers didn’t exist. Certainly not wafer-slim glass surfaces that connect you to, say, the goings on in Iceland or the Pope’s latest thought. That you can chat, videostream, bounce messages around the world via satellite, look at the weather radar, check the surf, find a recipe, buy a mutual fund and bounce around to any interest group known to humankind . . . whew, let’s celebrate the smart phone. And all portable digital media. From tablets to the laptop I’m tapping away on right now.
We love them! We love you, tech people of the world, who’ve put magic into the palm of our hand. Do you get enough thanks? Well, yes, judging by the PEs of your stock prices, but we want to thank you anyway. It’s a significantly enhanced realm we swim in now.
I’m appreciating you, highways with medians. And you, bridges over otherwise undrivable chasms. I’m digging you, gas stations and rest areas and clean-enough bathrooms across America.
Oh the things to relish:
food offerings everywhere
lights on street corners
flowers by the roadside
playgrounds peopled by little proto-adults
service with a smile
diners
big ole vans for work and play
engaging strangers
toothpicks
Christmas trees in Florida
Frogs, especially the ones that hop high and make splat sounds when they land
standing desks
hammocks
birds that take wing suddenly
squirrels
and the dogs that chase them
cool grass on a warm day
rain on our metal roof
a nap after hours of yardwork
pools!
bungee cords
seriously thin, soft sheets
interesting minds abounding, everywhere I turn
infectious goodness
that dude walking across the parking lot who picks up litter
our Mama
thick and purring soft throw rugs, the kind you can curl up on
reading books with your family, each lost in their own interior universe
the multiverse!
the peeps into surreality we get from time to time
moments of awe
moments of abandon
moments of sweet connection
So many things we use casually didn’t exist 50 years ago, and weren’t even fantasies 200 years ago. I love living in this era of dishwashers and dryers and hot water heaters and GPS navigational systems in your phone.
Billions of cosmic years aggregating star debris, hundreds of millions of years of evolutionary twists, thousands of years of innovation, decades of a life . . . . let’s enjoy these minutes of ours, so much went into their making.
I love you life! I love you breath — I love you drumbeat of my heart — I love you people of the world — I love you flora and fauna and fabulists — I love you near and I love you far — I love your wicked ways — I love your entrancing thoughts — I love the divine in you — I love the beast in you — I love fingers and toes and navels and napes — I love the way this keyboard feels as I go tappata tappata tap tap tappata — I love the light we flick on in the dark — I love those who’ve helped me through my darkness — I love those who let me in on their dark days — I love green tea — I love when you were mean to me — I love when you left me for another — I love the ways I improvised — I love the startling and transcendent beauty in pain — I love you for reading — I love me for writing — I love the warp and the woof — I love the right and the left — I love the ones who build and the ones who loaf — I love the way opposites make it all work — I love
