I don't think people are thankful enough. And I don’t think people are thankful enough for their bodies. So I'm going to take a moment here, before the mindless ecstasy of chocolate and biscuits, to notice what I'm thankful for about my body.
Well, as some of you know, I work as a medical secretary for a doctor. The doctor I work for is always extremely busy and therefore so am I.
He came to me about one month ago and told me to get the paperwork ready for a particular patient. As the patient has a serious form of cancer, he needed half of his tongue removed. It was a long and complicated procedure involving a large medical team, blood from the blood bank and up to 12 hours in theatre.
This morning I arrived at work as usual. I spent some time taking calls and chatting with my colleagues when there was a knock at the door. I opened it to be greeted by the above gentleman, dressed in pajamas and dressing gown. He handed me a sheet of paper with my job title on it.
I helped him to a chair and glanced at my colleagues. At this time every one was pretending to look busy.
Truthfully at this stage I wasn't sure which of us was going to pass out first! Me from shock (mostly because I had never seen someone so dangerously ill before)...and him for other reasons.
In a voice barely above a whisper, and between panting and wheezing, he managed to convey his query to me. The more he "talked", the stronger the image of Darth Vader was becoming in my mind. All that loud breathing....This gentleman is not quite 50 and does not have long left in this life as we know it.
I assured him I would take care of it and he set off back to the ward. My colleague turned to me and said "you handled that really well. I just couldn't look at him".
As I get older and turn a little bit more into my mom everyday, I get more sentimental and I want to celebrate and commemorate and stop and smell flowers and keep a gratitude journal and basically just take every opportunity to be self-reflective as the world around me is rushing off to Starbucks and to get in line for the next I-phone.
Which is why I'm going to pause for a moment and be thankful that I am whole. My entire body works, all at the same time. We learn very young to criticise our bodies and take little time to appreciate the fact that they work. Really it's wonderful to have a whole, functioning body. That’s kind of great in and of itself.
It's amazing how much I have to be thankful for. When you take a minute to think about what is good, it's amazing what you can come up with.