When I looked out the window this morning, the cat looked with me and mewed. Leaves bustled everywhere and a squirrel jumped from a high limb to the neighboring tree. "It's Thanksgiving, you see," I said to the cat, who mewed again. Either her voice or the realization made me think of my grandmother's cat. My grandmother had seven children. They all married, save one. Some married twice. Bucketfuls of grandchildren and barrels of memories washed over me. I give thanks daily for my simple life and all the good that comes my way; but I have learned a different lesson as I age: thanks alone is not enough. Ancestry aside, if I squander that which has been gifted me, being grateful means little. So, I set to work, cleaned the dishes, prepared the food,
paid the bills.Tomorrow I will wash clothes, make the bed, send a note of gratitude, change the litter box again. Then, I said, I will try my best at everything else. The cat mewed. Outside, wind warned the squirrel about life's fleeting nature, about how important it is to get those ducks lined up in little Martha Stewart rows. The thankful rodent, believing, ran down the tree trunk, right into the jaws of the hungry coyote. Thanksgiving? mused my prose-loving cat, who often knows me better than I know myself. "Don't be a wise-ass," I say. "Poetry is supposed to be profound."
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