Episode 36: Gratitude Journal Part Deux
Episode 36: Gratitude Journal Part Deux
Mimi Schmir, one of the writers from "Grey's Anatomy"
It was just about one year ago that I wrote my first gratitude journal. I must admit, it was not easy to feel grateful about a whore-mongering husband or a best friend who decided to set her beady, near-sighted eyes on my philandering spouse. But I remember thinking even at the time that it was important for me to take the high road. (Plus I had recently read in People that stress ages you, which was so not an acceptable option.) In any event, I remember sitting at my dining room table (which seemed so much larger once I kicked Jeffrey out) and trying to say the phrase, “Thank-you.” I kind of stuttered over the syllables, like suddenly English was a foreign language, and I remember my tongue felt like cotton in my mouth. (That might also have been the lobster I consumed in celebration of my newfound freedom. It seems that liberation gives me hives.)
However, even in my drunken stupor (of course, there was Chardonnay involved) I recognized my need to move beyond the petty stages of anger and frustration (I am at times, highly intuitive) and to embrace the new life that I knew was about to be mine. That said, there are many things that I am thankful for this year. So, in honor of Thanksgiving and new beginnings and cheating ex-husbands who give us all a new lease on life without even knowing it, I am going to share a few. If you would like to share back, please feel free. I am feeling the love this year.
So again, in no particular order (if you were here last time, you know the drill) here goes:
1. I am thankful for my children, Roo and Mr. Handsome (they insisted I put them in first.) I am thankful that they still love me even when I am not attentive as I should be and I am thankful that they let me keep them in long, curly, Leif Garret-looking hair.
2. I am thankful, of course, that their resemblance to L.G. stops with the curls. (If you are a child of the pot-smoking Seventies, you understand what I mean.)
3. I am thankful for Change. And Hope.
4. I am thankful for the smell of freshly laundered t-shirts, which means my washing machine is working.
5. I am thankful for condiments. (I like the little extras.)
6. I am thankful for the Op Ed page (not that I ever express my “Op’s” anywhere but here.)
7. I am thankful that I am part of the first generation to put an African American in the White House that was built by slaves.
8. I am thankful that even if you do not agree with me, I live in a country where we can all express our thoughts and feelings freely.
9. I am thankful that after what Jeffrey put me through, I still have thoughts and feelings. (Yay, me.)
10. I am thankful that Jeffrey moved to Costa Rica (did I forget to mention that earlier?)
11. I am thankful that Jeffrey went on the “walk about” that inspired him to move to Costa Rica to study ant societies so that he could maybe learn how to once again interact with humans. (Ants, if you’ve ever watched them, don’t cheat on their partners.)
12. I am thankful that Jeffrey is at heart, a gentle moron. (Who, oh yeah, sleeps with prostitutes.)
13. I am thankful that Annabelle still makes me feel better whenever I start to feel bad and that when we went back to Ojai the last time she didn’t make me wear a bikini.
14. I am thankful my boobs don’t touch my navel. (There’s always next year.)
15. I am thankful that I finally realized what Oprah says is true and that dieting doesn’t work. (At least not for girls who would trade their eyes for sugar.)
16. I am thankful that my skin hasn’t gotten so wrinkly that my tattoo looks weird. (And I am thankful that when I went back to get another one the kid at the tattoo parlor who talked me out of it called me, “Hot Mama.”)
17. I am thankful for my health such as it is. (I am disregarding colds and flu.)
18. I am thankful that my kids still don’t have a Wii.
19. I am thankful that my next door neighbor does have one, which means the kids can get it all out of their system over there. (And then some.)
20. I am thankful for boyfriends.
21. I am thankful that the HBPD hasn’t completely tired of me yet (or I, of him.)
22. I am thankful for sex (I may have mentioned that last time.)
23. I am thankful that this year I am getting some.
24. I am thankful that I stopped paying the “rent” on Jeffrey’s sperm at the sperm bank and that they have been released into the ocean. (It was like, three hundred bucks a year to keep them, I might add.)
25. I am thankful that the idea of some fish or whale getting some of Jeffrey’s sperm by mistake and creating some kind of weird Jeff-fish-whale-a-pus makes me laugh.
26. I am thankful that I still laugh, especially at myself. (Good thing, if you could see me.)
27. I am thankful that when death came to our lives this year (I should tell you that, after a lengthy illness, we lost my father) Roo said, very wisely, “But it is sad.”
28. I am thankful that I listened.
29. I am thankful that Mr. Handsome plays chess, because if I have learned anything this year, it is that chess in all its permutations is a very useful game. (Take that, Jeffrey’s overpaid celeb divorce attorney.)
30. I am thankful for where I came from and for where I am going.
31. I am thankful that I learned how to cook a Thanksgiving turkey with all the trimmings.
32. I am thankful that my divorce is about to come through.
33. I am thankful that I don’t have to wax as much as I used to. (TMI, I suppose, but the J-ster was all about the Brazilian.)
34. I am thankful that I never, not once, cooked Jeffrey a Thanksgiving bird so that now, the first Thanksgiving that I can actually cook one will be remembered more for the fact that I am a Top Chef than for his absence.
35. I am thankful that before my father died, he played many games of Brain Quest with my children. (And that he always beat them.)
36. (I am thankful not because I lost him, but for what he gave me.)
37. I am thankful for what I have found.
38. I am thankful for chocolate, of course (some things never change.)
39. Um…I know it may sound all mushy for someone like me, but really, and I mean this — I am thankful for you.
40. Finally, I am thankful that now I don’t have to think about how thankful I am until next year. Because, take it from me — even an enlightened, “about-to-be-liberated-from-the-shackles-of-catastrophic-matrimony” divorcee,” has her limits.
What are you thankful for?
xoxo
Esme
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