Gratitude as a Flotation Device

I almost skipped my annual Thanksgiving-related blog post this year, for a number of reasons. Firstly, I’m exhausted—still recovering from/adjusting to my gargantuan move to Australia six months ago, as well as the temporary (hopefully) loss of my creative spirit, which apparently got held up in Customs upon my May arrival in Sydney. Secondly, Thanksgiving isn’t celebrated in Australia, so I figured I could get off on a technicality.

But then it hit me: Thanksgiving isn’t about geography, and it certainly isn’t about loopholes or doing the bare minimum or self-pity. It’s about gratitude. It’s about appreciating just how fortunate you are to be walking around and breathing above ground even if there are days when you feel you’re drowning.

And here’s the beautiful thing about gratitude—it floats in anything. All you need to do is grab onto it to keep your head above water.

So, sure, there may be some waves knocking me around, some baby sharks circling, but they don’t distract from the fact I have a helluva lot to be grateful for.

Below are the five things topping that list:

My Family. I don’t know where I’d be or what I’d do without the love and support of my wife, Miranda. And my daughter, Leah. And my parents, Lynne and Stu. And my older brother, Todd. (Not to mention my wonderful in-laws!) Living in the same household or even just having regular phones calls with a moody, anxious, somewhat delusional writer like me is challenging, to say the least. “Would you people three rooms over please stop breathing so much—I’m trying to write a novel in here!” Or “I know we haven’t spoken in weeks, but can you call back later—I’m very busy disposing of an imaginary body.”

The hell that I put my characters through is a picnic compared to the hell I put my loved ones through. Because the hell I put my loved ones through is real, despite the fact that I do it in the name of fiction—fiction that in most cases relatively few people will ever read. Fiction that rarely pays the bills—or even a bill. Fiction that … is fiction. So the fact that my family still loves me and accepts me for the freak I am is a highly thankable offense.

My Dog. I was going to include my dog, Wallaby, in the “Family” section above, but he’s so damn beautiful and such a daily source of joy and unconditional love, I just had to give him his own subhead—even though doing so puts me at real risk of having my face eaten by my cat, Dingo.

My tremendous gratitude for Wallaby was made all the stronger very recently, when he had a frightening brush with death—courtesy of the Australian paralysis tick Miranda found embedded in his neck. (I’ll spare you the details; however, if you’re curious, you can google the name of the venomous parasite in question, you sick bastard.) Thanks to Miranda’s discovery and our vet’s skillful administration of the antiserum, Wallaby has made a full recovery and will live to see many more days of us spoiling the shit out of him.

My Friends. While most of my friends are imaginary, I do have a handful of real-life cronies I’m very close with even though they live thousands of miles away. Unlike my imaginary ones, most of the real-life ones aren’t criminals. But I don’t hold that against them. They’re still good people, and I’m lucky to have them in my life. (I’d list their names here, but I don’t want them to undergo the scrutiny of the FBI or any other law enforcement agency just for being acquainted with the likes of me. See, I’m a good friend.)

My Readers. Despite me not having put out a new novel in some time, I’m extremely fortunate to have a wonderful, loyal group of readers who can’t wait till I DO. And honestly, them buying my books isn’t even the best part of our relationship. The best part is knowing that each time I start a blog post or a newsletter intro or a short story, there’s people out there who give at least a little bit of a damn, folks who’ll “listen” to the words bleeding from my fingertips. Many writers claim, “I write for myself.” Well, they’re lying. For they, just like me, live for having others peruse their personal thoughts and ideas and creative outbursts, their shameless self-promotion, their wild rants, their cries for help.

There are so many other things people could be doing or have to do that don’t involve reading a single word I write. So whenever someone lets me in—even if it’s through the tiniest sliver and for only a few moments here and there, I don’t take it for granted. And if you’re reading this, I can only assume you’re one of those someones. So, seriously, THANK YOU.

My Scenery. Sydney and the surrounding area—and, really, Australia in general—is ridiculously, stunningly, almost obscenely beautiful. I’ve been here a full six months, and rarely does a day go by that my jaw doesn’t drop at the sight of some seaside cliff or coastal sunrise/sunset or impossibly colorful bird or flowering tree.

You have two primary choices in the treatment of anxiety and depression around these parts: 1) take medication; or 2) just step outside and open your eyes.

Whether or not you celebrate Thanksgiving, here’s hoping the things you have to be grateful for far, far outweigh whatever you may be struggling with.