Daily Ramblings – Thankful Thursday – Life

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Adventures, experiences, Grateful, Learning, Life, Thankful Thursday, Thanks

Today, I’m grateful for life. Oh, the adventures I’ve had. Some horrific, others wonderful. But the journey has been a great ride.

I’ve experienced love and heartbreak, achievement and failure, sickness and good health. Opposites are the nature of our universe. We have light and dark, good and evil, fun and boring, and the list goes on and on.

What makes the journey worthwhile? The ups and downs. When you’re up, you’re on top of the world. When you’re down, it sucks. But either side of this equation is necessary, so we know the difference.

How many people truly cherish life? It really depends on their outlook and belief system. For the nihilists out there, life is meaningless. For the optimist, everything is terrific. I think you’d be hard pressed to find someone that is totally this or that. Instead, you’ll find people that are in the middle somewhere.

I have always chosen optimism over nihilism. Perhaps I was lucky with my upbringing. Perhaps I was born at the right time period. Honestly, I choose to be happy.

My father taught me a terrific way to look at things. He said, “Son, you will always have things you have to do in life. You have to go to school, you have to work, you have to fulfill your responsibilities. You will not escape these responsibilities, unless of course, you want to have a hard life. If you fail to graduate your life will be hard. No one will want to hire you. If you don’t want to work, you will starve, or you will live a life of crime to support yourself. If you’re irresponsible, you will cause great pain for yourself and anyone that joins you on your life’s journey. So you have a choice. You can do the things you are required to do happily, or you can be pissed off your whole life. I choose to be happy. What will you choose?”

Obviously, I choose to be happy. Why be pissed off about the things you have to do anyway? The choice to me was obvious.

So today I’m grateful for the gift of life. I’m grateful for the things I’ve done and the things I have not done. I am grateful for the people who have come and gone in my life. I am grateful for the teachers and mentors who have helped me learn something new, grasp a new concept, or suggested I make an adjustment to the way I think or act. All of these things are a blessing.

Happy Thursday, folks!

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Thankful Thursday – Grateful for Reading

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Adventures, Books, Expanding Your Mind, ideas, Learning, Libraries, Places, Reading, Romance

A study at the Pew Research Center posits that 27% of America did not read a single book in the last year. That’s a pretty astounding number when you take into account the amount of free books online, online resources provided by local libraries, and available for free at your local library. Enough of my lecturing.

I’m grateful for reading and my ability to read. I love books. I love learning. I love nonfiction and history more than I do fiction, but I still love a great fiction story, particularly science fiction. I love reading stories of exploring other planets, space battles, laser gun fights, you name it.

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No entertainment is so cheap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting. Mary Wortley Montagu.

When I read a book, I’m taken away. I experience the history, the adventure, the drama. It is hard to describe the feeling you get when a great book carries you away. You lose track of time.

So, thank you, to every author that has taken me to a new place. Thanks to the historians that taught me something about a civilization, a war, that told me how we looked at our world 100 years ago, 300 years ago, 500 years ago.

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If you don’t read, give it a whirl. Find a topic or type of story you like. Do you like being scared? Pick up a thriller. Do you like to read about love? Find a romance novel. Do you like history and a good story? Pick up a historical fiction book. There are so many choices and so many books available. You don’t need any money. Go to your local library. Heck, reach out to your grandparents. If they are still alive, I bet they have a lot of books to lend you.

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If you don’t have the time to read, you don’t have the time or the tools to write. Stephen King

In closing, I love to read and grateful for the ability to read. It teaches me; it engages me; it opens my mind to other ideas, times, and places. Pick up a book and read it. You will be different when you’re done.

Until next time…

Dave