For now, I will wrap up this series of gratitude-giving. When I think of thanks-giving, I think of people first. I may not have as high a number of friends as many people I’ve known over the years have been blessed to have had, but I am grateful for the people God has put in my life over the years, some of whom have come and gone, others who have stayed faithfully and put up with me.
As I built out my list, it became glaringly obvious that
Jesus needed to be the centerpiece (if you’ve been reading along my posts
especially in the last month, you’ll see why). Without Him, I don’t have
anyone. Without Him, I have nothing. As such, once it became clear that this
series could potentially stretch until Christmas, I decided to honor Him on His
birthday.
But I’m also grateful for things. I often have complained
about things (or more accurately, the lack of things), and so I will
dedicate this final, epilogue of a post to the things I’m grateful for.
- I’m grateful for my 9-to-5 job, a fully-remote management consulting job that specializes in procurement. Over 2 years ago my bosses took a chance on me, and I’m glad to say I’ve been able to learn, develop skills, and now have experience that I can parlay into a higher-paying gig and ultimately a reasonably stable career, at the right time.
- I’m also grateful for my second job, for supplemental-income reasons as well as for the opportunity to be part of a worship experience that combines traditional church music with the contemporary praise-and-worship music (the world refers to this as “Praise Band”).
- Continuing within the music-related scope, I’m grateful for Finale, MIDI, and GarageBand. I’m also grateful for my computers, that my love’s parents allow me to use their printer, and the flash drive that my future mother-in-law has graciously lent to me.
- I’m grateful for the opportunity to be able to save a decent amount of money for the first time in my life. Until this job, I’ve almost always lived paycheck to paycheck, and am blessed to have a little bit of a cushion for the first time in my life. I still lag far behind almost all of my peers in terms of career building and long-term financial stability, but I’m now a lot farther than I used to be.
- I’m grateful for my love’s family dog, the first big dog (relatively speaking) that I’ve been able to feel safe enough to come to love. For those of you who don’t know me, I grew up very much a “cat” person. Small dogs were ok, but big dogs freak me out. My love’s family dog isn’t “big” compared to what most people would consider a big dog. But she’s big to me. And in some of her quirks she reminds me a little of both Cotton and Teya.
- I’m grateful for my church, and all the people who have welcomed me there. I’m grateful for the second church at which I hold my second (part-time) job as a band keyboardist. I’m grateful for the positive experiences I still will experience upon the occasional visit to my former church (I do still have a few friends there). I do also have one friend with whom I have weekly phone calls that I don’t believe I’ve mentioned in any of the posts in this series, so I will mention now that I am grateful for and for our friendship.
- I’m grateful for Covenant Eyes and for Leechblock, both of which helps keep me grounded and not giving into temptation nearly as much as I otherwise might. And I’m grateful for my accountability friendships/relationships with the two men I call weekly, one of whom I mentioned in just the last paragraph.
- There’s a very good chance I’m still forgetting a few things in my life, but I’ve exhausted all I can think of at this time. If I’ve missed anything, I’m grateful for those things as well.