November 28: Day of Thankfulness, Good Friend, "Bigfoot Gives Thanks"

I didn't want this day of thankfulness to pass without sharing some thoughts before I head off to bed.

Sometimes, life doesn't turn out the way you expect.  A snow storm hits, and suddenly you're stranded in an airport instead of eating turkey and mashed potatoes with your family.  You wake up in the morning, and your car won't start.  A second-rate reality television star becomes President of the United States.  

Life simply has a way of throwing curve balls at you all the time.

I have a good friend who's hurting this evening.  A person full of love and smiles, all the time.  My friend's life has been affected significantly by addiction.  The person she loves the most has become a stranger to her.  I understand the pain and grief  that she's going through.  It's like dragging fathoms and fathoms of chains around with you, to borrow an image from A Christmas Carol.  No matter where you are, what your'e doing, who you're with--you just can't escape it.

Today is Thanksgiving.  This morning, my friend texted me and said, "I'm just not feeling it."

I want to remind my friend that she is surrounded by angels.  She can be thankful for that.  I want to remind her that, even in the eye of the hurricane, she can find peace.  She can be thankful for that.  And I want to remind her, especially, that life isn't defined by curve balls.  It's defined by how much she is loved.  She can be thankful for that.

Be well, my friend.  I said a prayer for you this evening.  It was a prayer of thanks.  That you exist, and that you bring light into the world.

You are one of the blessings in Saint Marty's life this Thanksgiving.

Bigfoot Gives Thanks

by:  Martin Achatz

after Gerard Manley Hopkins

He doesn’t chase down a turkey, wring

its pink neck like a wet dish rag,

gut it with his thumb, cook it

in sun and fly and maggot for days,

serve it with sides of chewed yam,

moose marrow, fermented pumpkin

guts, green with time, smelling

strong as a bear den at winter’s end.

He doesn’t smooth his hair with mud,

brush his teeth with fresh milkweed,

cram himself into a church pew

beside blue-haired widows who look

at his gorilla arms and long

to feel their dead husbands’ dark

embraces in bed at night again.

Doesn’t stand when the organ

starts breathing music, raise the siren

of his voice to “Now Thank We

All Our God” until the stained glass

rattles and fractures, letting seams

of pure white stitch all gathered

with the shook foil of the world.

No.  His way is simpler, a morning

glory leaning toward day, unfolding,

shaking off the teary dew of darkness.

Stand outside at dawn or dusk.  The bent

world is charged with his hairy

gratitude, in the long-legged shadows

of first and last light as they stretch

and stretch and stretch down the street,

across railroad trestle, through hayfields,

cornfields, into pines and poplar--

further and further and further--mountain,

swamp and lake, canyon and cave,

ocean, glacier, savanna, desert,

until, at last, they have touched it

all.  All the grandeur of deep down things.