P.S. Forgot the Gratitude

In this YouTwitFace age of mass public attention-seeking, I worry a bit about the electronic exhibitionism I am nurturing, in my already lookie-here ego, by daily social networking and semi-confessional blogging.  As the life-imitating-art memoir becomes ever more ubiquitous -- Elizabeth Gilbert received a $200,000 advance to chronicle the life-altering experiences in Eat, Pray, Love before she'd had them! -- there may something more authentic and gracious about hiding your light under a nice, private bushel.


But Lucy Calkins, in The Art of Teaching Writing, asserts that that writers lead more "wide awake lives" as a result -- they are better able to see the significance of events as they shape the narrative of them on the page.  Writing has always been, for me, a powerful tool for making sense of the jumble of memories and thoughts that crowds my brain, and usually evaporates if unattended.  And the expectant hum of an audience motivates my clarity, volume and stamina.


So the blog will continue, and even the gratitude (yesterday's, below) goes cyber.  But I will refrain from excessive collar-grabbing.  I may not hide my light under a bushel, but I won't advertise it daily, either.  I am grateful for all who have read my musings here and elsewhere, and have encouraged, responded and even quoted, nearly forty years after the fact, in the case of my high school bud Susan!  I hope you will continue to tune in every now and then.


Gratitude, July 8, 2010


1.  I am grateful for my husband's daily phone call from work, which I've actually been able to answer this week, just to chat and tell me he loves me.


2.  I am grateful for my pretty, edgy buzz cut, this time from the barber on the corner, $14.


3.  I am grateful that the barber charged me, without my having to ask, the $14 men's price instead of the $17 women's rate, which I would have paid but silently resented.


4.  I am grateful for the long, chatty call from my brilliant, beautiful Minnie.


5.  I am grateful that the book I am reading, Tom Rachman's The Imperfectionists, has been living up to Christopher Buckley's insanely glowing review, and that it had the cosmic and ego-gratifying sense to be about American writers living in Rome.


6.  I am grateful for the very long walk I took in today's lovely, breezy break from the recent dog days.


7.  I am grateful for my work, which I very nearly love, but more so for the sabbatical from it.


8.  I am grateful for the gifts, from my parents, of creativity, intelligence and resilience.


9.  I am grateful for the gifts, left at my door in a wicker basket, of optimism and engagement.


10.  I am grateful for my new bras, because gratitude comes in small -- um, I mean ordinary -- packages.