Special Weekly Blog, Thanksgiving 2017: Giving Thanks

Hello Internet!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful Thanksgiving! No matter if you’re watching the Parade or eating Turkey with your family or if it’s just another Thursday for you, I hope you have a wonderful day. I just wanted to post a special, Weekly Blog talking about the things I am Thankful For. I talked a little about it in this past Sunday’s Weekly Blog all about Thanksgiving, but I wanted to elaborate a little more. Also if you liked this blog, feel free to give it a like or even leave a comment down below. Let me know what you are doing for Thanksgiving or what you are thankful for his Holiday season. Ok here’s a list of the things I’m thankful for this Thanksgiving:

1. Family:

First of all I am thankful for my family. I have two loving parents who support me and haven’t kicked me out of their house yet. We all like to tease one another and even be annoying at times, but in the end we really do love each other. Plus I’m pretty sure my Mom is the only one who actually reads my Blog, so thanks Mom! Also I’m thankful for my Brothers. I have one older brother and one younger. There’s a strange group dynamic where we all can get along as long as only two of us are in the house together, but as soon as the third brother is added, I usually become the punching bag. I don’t mind it too much though, because I know deep, down inside it’s just their way of showing their love for me. They’ll deny it, but I know the truth!

I’m also thankful for my extended family including Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Grandparents, etc. It helps to have a safety net of people around you who support you. I’m lucky enough to have an extended family full of support and love on both my Mom’s side of the family and my Dad’s side of the family. They are such a diverse group of personalities and characteristics and they add so much to the family. I love all of them and so glad they are in my life.

2. Friends:

The second thing I am thankful for is my Friends. I have a close knit group of Friends which I’ve known since High School and the few years since graduation. More and more it has become hard for all of us to get together and hang out because of conflicting work schedules, but we still make it work. Whenever we are together, we always have a blast! These friends have become like my second family to me and my life is better because they are in it. The loyalty we have for each other is strong and our love for one another is stronger. These people have helped me through thick and thin and have always had my back. That is the kind of friendship that you can’t buy. It’s a friendship built on a foundation of love and understanding and support.

This also extends to my Friends’ families. I have become adopted into my friend’s family as the son they never had. They support me and love me just like they raised me and I’m always welcome at their home. I just walk in like I belong there and I’m showered in food and love. Sometimes they treat me better than my actual blood relatives! So I’m thankful for them as well this Thanksgiving season!

3. My Dog:

My Dog’s name is Brady and he’s a Golden Retriever-Lab Mix. He’s an old dog, but still full of energy. He still loves chasing frisbees, chewing on sticks, and causing all sorts of trouble. Brady is an outside dog, but during the winter he spends a lot of time inside where it’s warm. He likes to cause trouble in the house and he gets yelled at by my parents a lot, but I try to balance this out my giving him some attention and pets. I love him so much and I try to make sure he knows how much of a good boy he is. Whenever I am down, I can count that he’ll be excited to see me and more than willing to cover my face in puppy kisses.

4. Food:

So today is Thanksgiving and of course there is going to be a lot of food. The turkey, mash potatoes, chicken pot pie, deviled eggs, and corn bread. All of it will be amazing and I’m going to be so full for the next week. Like for weeks afterwards, I can’t eat turkey because my turkey quota is completely filled. I am thankful for all the food that I’ll eat during this Thanksgiving season as well as for the people who prepared the food. I’m also thankful for the situation I am in where I don’t have to worry about food. Yeah there are days where there is not a lot of groceries in the house, but I’m never starving. I’ve never had to beg food food or money for food on the street. I’ve always been well fed and never had to struggle for food. That’s a statement that not everyone can make, so that’s why I’m thankful for food.

5. Education:

I am thankful for the life experiences I’ve had that has led me to where I am now. One of these is my Education. I went to a small, rural High School with a graduating class of 60 kids (that’s not a typo). I was good in High School with A’s and B’s for my grades. I was then able to go to any of the three State Colleges I applied for and ended up getting a wonderful Education. I majored in Political Science and English and graduated Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Arts. I was able to graduate in three years thanks to the fact that I took college classes when I was a Junior and Senior in High School. College led to a ton of amazing opportunities and I met some amazing people who I am still friends with to this day. There were some classes that I hated and did bad in, but there were others that were really interesting with awesome professors I still talk to via email from time to time. Although I have not yet landed my dream job, I am still happy with the education I’ve gotten and I don’t regret the experiences I’ve had. Yeah I have a ton of debt that I’ll spend the rest of my life paying off, but that’s the risk I took and so far I’m glad I took it.

6. Job:

Like I said, I have not landed my dream job. Right now I’m just working at a Hotel/Restaurant where I am the front desk person. I have been at this job for just over a year now. I struggled as soon as I graduated college. I thought that I would graduate and find an amazing job within the same week or at least the same month. Well that didn’t happen and still hasn’t happened. However I did stumble upon a job for a “Front Desk Position” in late September of 2016. Now I had experience of managing a Front Desk so I thought that I could do that job for three months before I find something else. Now here I am a year older. A lot of the time I feel like I’m in a rut at my job and that the longer I am here, the less likely I will leave. I can’t deny that I feel those things; however, for the time being I am happy with the job. It allows me to live and pay off my debts each month as well as have a little bit of money left over to hang out with friends or go out and eat. My job isn’t bad. It is pretty good pay, good hours, and good coworkers. It’s just not what I’m passionate about. For now I’m thankful for the job I have and I recognize that there are people who would love to have the job I have. I’m looking for a new job, but I’m thankful for my current state of employment.

7. Emergency Personnel:

 I’m thankful for all the Firefighters, Police Officers, Doctors, Nurses, EMT Personnel, and other Emergency Personnel that is working this Holiday Season instead of being with their families. Hopefully they get a little time off so they can have some Turkey and stuff, but I know that they are always on call around Holidays. I appreciate how hard they work during this season and every other time during the year. They are out there working their butts off while the rest of us get to enjoy our holiday because of them. So Thank You for everyone out there working for the holidays! I appreciate the sacrifice you are making.

I also want to express my thanks for the Military Personnel that are working this Holiday and the ones that are deployed around the world and can’t be with their families for Thanksgiving. Thank you for your sacrifice that you make every day for people like me living comfortably in the United States. I know that I could never survive in the military and that makes me appreciate everything they do that much more. I go through so much just to join the military and then they get sent around the world to be in some of the worst situations imaginable. Then they come home and they suffer from low wages, mental illness, and poor healthcare. It’s terrible how we treat our veterans and active duty personnel. I hope things improve for everyone who is currently serving or has served in the past and I hope you enjoy your Thanksgiving no matter where you are in the world or what you are doing this holiday season. I truly cannot express my thanks enough for the people in the military, but hopefully I can say Thank You and that will be enough for now.

8. America:

I’m thankful for the country I live in and the freedoms we have to express. This week there were revolts in Zimbabwe where people threw out their dictator and proclaimed that they were going to be a free people. Only time can tell if Zimbabwe will truly be a free Democracy. All of this makes me reflect on America which is the country where I live. Our country isn’t perfect. We’ve had a long history of mistakes and terrible things between how we treated the Native Populations, the African Slaves, the immigrant populations, and whole lot more. We’re not perfect. Even today we live in a world of turmoil where it seems that people are screaming at one another and at each other’s throats over every issue. However; I like to look on the positives. I like to focus on the people coming together after the nasty Hurricanes hit Texas and Florida and how they’ve begun to rebuild. I focus on the common ground that we do have. I know it looks like Americans can’t get along or agree on things politically, but I think that’s a load of carp. If we sit down and really talk to one another, we quickly realize that there is a ton of stuff we can agree on. There is common ground. And I believe Thanksgiving is the time where we should focus on that. Not all of us belong to the far right or the far left camps where no other opinion is valued. Actually the silent majority fits into the middle where we think both sides actually have good ideas. That’s the America that I choose to live in and focus on this holiday season. I’m thankful that I live in a country that upholds the values of democracy,  personal liberty, free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of press, and freedom of assembly. We live in a country that protects people’s ability to scream and yell at each other on everything from who should be leader of the country to whether or not pinapple belongs on pizza. We don’t have to be on the streets trying to overthrow our dictator, because our ancestors did that in the 1770s. Our founders drew up the US Constitution which is still the oldest Constitution in existence and I’m glad we keep that going. That’s the America I love and the America that I’m thankful for. I’m glad I live here and are able to work on making it better and better. Maybe my vision of America isn’t the same as yours, but I’m willing to sit down and listen to you so that we can figure out the best way forward together as Americans.

9. This Blog

That last thing that I want to express my thankfulness for is This Blog and the Audience that reads it. Yes, I’m thankful for you! I’m so glad that you’ve taken some time out of your busy holiday to read this special Weekly Blog. I am so thankful that I am able to put my words out into the world and people from all over read them and actually like them. I’m almost a year into Blogging and running this website and I’ve learned a ton about writing, Word Press, and myself through writing and publishing. I never thought that I would write a single thing down let alone almost 150 different pieces covering things like Politics, Blogs, and Creative Writing pieces. Honestly, every time I get a like or comment from the community, it just makes my day. I’m just so happy that people are reading and enjoying the stuff I write. Even a single like on a new piece is enough to make me happy for the entire day. So thank you so much for all your support. It really means a lot to me. I know that I sometimes sound like a broken record when I get all sappy about how much I love my readers, but all of it is true. I really do appreciate all the support everyone sends my way.

 

I hope everyone enjoyed reading that Weekly Blog. If you did feel free to give it a like or leave a comment down below. Maybe tell me about your favorite Thanksgiving tradition or Thanksgiving meal. Or maybe you can tell me what you are thankful for this Thanksgiving. Whatever you leave down below, I will read. Also if you really liked the stuff I wrote, think about spending some time on the website checking out the other stuff I’ve written. This week is strange because of Thanksgiving, but we’ll get back to our normal schedule starting next week. There will be a Weekly Blog on Sunday, new chapter of my Pokemon Fanfiction on Wednesday, and a Writing Prompt inspired piece on Friday.

Thank you again and have a Happy Thanksgiving!

-Allen_The_Writer

 

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Header Photo Credit to The Wishwall’s Blog about Thanksgiving
http://thewishwall.org/desideri/be-thankful/