Take a Moment to Say Thanks

Thanksgiving is traditionally a time to count your blessings and appreciate the people and things, great and small, that bring joy, love and laughter to your life. This year, the second Thanksgiving observed during the global COVID pandemic, I’d like to do just that.

Thank you to all those working in front-line jobs across the country – the doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other healthcare workers who, burned out as they are, still show up every day to care for their patients.

Thank you to the grocery, retail and foodservice staff who deal with more than their fair share of “Karens and Darens” while doing their best to keep essential retail operating smoothly.

Thank you to all those who resist the urge to vent your frustrations on targets of convenience, those who not only “Keep Calm & Carry On” but do so with compassion and kindness. We need more of you in this world.

Thank you for solid science that creates vaccines to keep us safe from preventable diseases. In just the last year the world has been given multiple vaccines for COVID-19 and one for malaria, a disease that kills thousands of people, many of them children, every year around the world.

Thank you to everyone who has waited in line or booked appointments to get the shots that protect not only yourself but everyone around you. Your actions mean that we, as a community, can begin to gather with loved ones and venture out to restaurants, cinemas and sporting events again.

Thank you to everyone around the world who reads and comments on the blog here. These online interactions go a long way to make us all feel connected, especially when we can’t meet in person.

And finally, Thank you to my own family, who keep me sane when my anxieties get the best of me, just as I try to support them through their own rough patches. I’m so glad I don’t have to do this on my own.

Be well, stay safe, and, as a wise man one said,

Keep your stick on the ice. We’re all in this together.

-Steve Smith (Red Green)