Happy Thanksgiving!

A rare thing today!  I am cross-posting a post from my 'professional' blog.  I think it's pretty cool that it fits both with my writer side and my mommy side!

I hope everyone is enjoying their Thanksgiving holiday in the States!  I have been waist-deep in family and am just now coming out of my food-induced coma. 

Thanksgiving has always been one of my favorite holidays, but this year it was different for me.  Oh, I’ve always thought about what I have to be thankful for, I’ve always taken my turn at the dinner table to name one such thing, but this year, I finally get it.  I understand what being thankful is.  I understand that I should and now, do, take the time to be thankful every day.  I see the small, seemingly insignificant things we take for granted and I am thankful for them.  Maybe it’s an age thing, I don’t know, but this new-found gratitude fills me so completely I am almost overwhelmed by it. And it’s good.

Making my short list of things to be thankful for this year (just ahead of Oyster Dressing) is being a writer.  I love being a writer.  I love the click of the keyboard.  I love the hours spent researching.  I love the excitement of a new character or plot.  I love the new writer friends I’ve made this year.  I love that they make me feel less alone, less alien-like.  But in my writer life, the thing I’m most thankful for this year is an important lesson I’ve learned.  The lesson, being published is not what it’s all about.  Do I want the novel I’ve worked on for 2 ½ years to be published?  Yes!  But will that change anything?  Not really.  I’m still going to be me.  I’m still going to be a wife, a mother, a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a friend.  Still, me.  And being a writer has made me a better wife, mother, daughter, sister, aunt and friend.  It has made me a better person.  And that is worth more than a book deal any day.

So, a toast!  To too much food, drink, laughs and hugs this weekend!  To all the wonderful, exciting changes to come in the next year! 

And in loving memory of my sainted Irish grandfather,

“May you always have work for your hands to do. 
May your pockets hold always a coin or two. 
May the sun shine bright on your windowpane. 
May the rainbow be certain to follow each rain. 
May the hand of a friend always be near you. 
And may God fill your heart with gladness to cheer you.”