Thankful
I walked my daughter Sophia out to her car this morning so that she could ride to school. I quickly calculated when I went back inside that I’ve put Sophia in that car more than 2000 times over the last 11 years that she has been attending the Faison School in Richmond. The Faison School is a school designed for children like Sophia who have numerous special needs and whose educational needs can’t be met in the regular public school. Amy and I and Sophia love the people and her teachers at the Faison School. They have done so much for her.
We also love Sophia’s drivers John and Marilyn who have been taking Sophia back and forth from Caroline to Richmond for a bunch of years now. I try to remember to say thank you each morning before I close the car door, although I’m sure I’ll failed to do so on numerous occasions. As a parent it is such a comfort to know that your child is being cared for and loved. Sophia loves John too. She sits up in the front seat by him. She waits in the chair at our house in the morning and will speak his name waiting for him to pull in the driveway. She loves to see him out in the community. She looks for him at the high school football games and then talks about him after she has seen him and given him a hug.
I’m so grateful that we have had such great folks like John and Marilyn driving and caring for our daughter. I’m not sure however that I’ve always done a good job at expressing that gratitude. I often think grateful thoughts and I often feel grateful in my heart, but sometimes I fail to express it to them. And yet what I also realize is that unexpressed gratitude is the same as ingratitude! Unexpressed gratitude is the same as or at least has the same effect in the world as ingratitude. I suspect we all face it. We feel grateful, we think grateful thoughts, but sometimes we aren’t the best at expressing our gratitude towards other people.
I think how much better our world could be if we all learned to express our gratitude. How much better would our community be if we rather than just think grateful thoughts, we actually spoke and expressed our gratitude to those who mean so much to us? How much happier could our homes be if we all focused on not just feeling grateful, but actually told the people in our lives how much we appreciate them.
It’s learning to get in the car today and say sweetheart I’m thankful for you. I’m thankful that you married me. Kids I’m thankful for you. Tell your boss you’re thankful for your job. Tell your employees you’re thankful for the work they do. It starts not with grateful hearts, but in learning to express them. I’m convinced if we could start to do that, we will not only bring some joy to others lives, we will learn to sustain even more joy in our own life.
Hey John and Marilyn thank you!
