Gratitude

Of all the values and virtues one can have, as I see it, one of the most valuable is Gratitude. However, it isn't an easy value to understand or to posses.

A while back I was considering getting rid of television in my home. My 16 year old daughter stated emphatically that she could not live without it. I laughed. And then I started to tell her all of the things that we have today that didn't exist when I was 16.

It is a long and distinguished list. No CDs, VCRs or DVDs. No microwave ovens. No Personal Computers. It was the time of eight track stereos in cars and reel-to-reel at home. I explained that we had transistor radios, but no walkmans. It was the days of slide rulers and the $100+ four-function calculators. It was a day before Internet and the web. Pong made the scene almost three years after my sixteenth birthday. It was a big deal. I remember going to Sears at lunchtime with my boss just so he could play. I watched.

My daughter had a stunned look on her face throughout my rant. At the end her reply was a heartfelt, "I would not want to LIVE!" I ended up keeping our cable television subscription. Mostly for the golf on ESPN. But the whole exchange is something that I've considered many times since. It's become part of the lore of our family.

I was thinking about this conversation last year when my wife and I toured the Vanderbilt's summer home in New Port, RI. This place was a 50,000+ square foot catastrophe built of marble and granite. The modern conveniences were running water, indoor toilets and big mirrors. The Breakers was built in 1892 and this was pretty stylin' for the times. Two obvious conveniences missing were central heating and anything to do with electricity. This place had about 30 or so fireplaces and an impressive collection of candle holders. The mirrors helped to reflect the candlelight and make the place brighter.

From a technology standpoint, Jefferson's Monticello had a few more cool, functional gadgets and it was built more than 100 years before The Breakers. That's not completely fair, because Jefferson lived at Monticello and continued to make improvements for several decades. The Breakers was just an indulgent summer diversion for the Vanderbilts.

But I'm getting sidetracked. My main point is that anyone living in the USA today has some pretty cool technology readily available that even the richest families of the 19th Century could not have. These things we take for granted today didn't even exist a short time ago. We don't have to be rich or influential to have all, or at least most, of these modern conveniences.

We have so much and we don't show appreciation. Most of us spend a majority of our time wanting more. Gratitude helps to put our world into proper perspective. Gratitude is not just an idea. And it is not just an ideal. Gratitude is more than being thankful and expressing it. Gratitude is thankfulness coupled with actions.

Service is gratitude with action.

That's all for now......
8:02:07 PM    comment []