Gratitude
I have never been very good at gratitude. This is perhaps odd for a guy who was born on Thanksgiving Day.
My mom, now 90 years old, tells me that she is proud of me and adds that anything
I have accomplished I have done on my own. This saddens me, because she is often stuck in feelings of inadequacy and failure that have little to do with reality. We all try to remind her of our great memories of times together, of sacrifices she made, of the triumphs each of us have experienced. As she has Thanksgiving dinner today with my sister Jennifer and her extended 
family, I hope she is able to see a bit of the wonder of all the young lives around her, lives she
has had a part in bringing into being and becoming the vibrant people that they are.
But this is not about my mother, it is about how erroneous her statement and my entrenched egotism are. Because of multiple developments over the past years, I am
increasingly learning that I have nothing that was not given to me and that I am deeply indebted to all the people who encouraged, cajoled, corrected, and inspired me through my nearly 68 years.
The images on this page (mainly of my grandchildren) are rflective of the multitude of people I am grateful to and for today. If you are reading this, even if you merely delete it, thank you for how you have impacted my life.