Remembering.

If your family is like my family then you too probably have the same "dreaded" tradition every Thanksgiving/Christmas when each person says a thing or two they are thankful for. I say "dreaded" because it seems like every year I say, Can we please not do the what your thankful for thing....and we do...and it  seems like this is the part where everyone gets all emotional.

Paw Paw always said, "I'm thankful for my family, even though I couldn't give y'all everything I wanted to I am thankful y'all love me anyway" and he would always be holding a white tissue and remove his glasses for just a second to wipe away one alligator tear then continue by making a joke to lighten the mood and say, "Sometimes I'm thankful for my boys and their wives too." Maw Maw Jewel always said, "I just love all of y'all so much" and that was about as much as she could get out because she would be crying and then just wave her hands motioning for the next person to go ahead and give theirs. My cousins who read this - can vouch for me....these words seemed to be a part of the tradition.
In one of the past few years - uncle Terry, as sick as he was....said, "I am thankful for my girls and for my health keeping me here" now as you can imagine....that left not a dry eye in the room....a man who is barely breathing being thankful for his health.....that will make you not complain about your headache huh?! :)

So where I am going with this blog entry? My intentions were to reflect and figure out what I will say this year and how I will word it in as few as words as possible to avoid getting choked up. In the beginning I figured I would just go with the usual...thankful for my family, salvation, job, an amazing year by the Gamecocks (no so usual haha) but....my response has changed.
I just realized that this "dreaded" tradition apparently is one that I don't dread too much if I am taking the time to blog about it and even more than that can remember what people have said. So it must mean more to me than I thought!

I love looking back and remembering things....I never really did it that often before this year. Sometimes I would think about MawMaw after she passed away and stuff she said or did and just laugh because she was always being funny. Maybe because I am older now, but  once paw paw passed away I started to realize the only way to keep his presence close is to think back to certain days and times and remember them.

So that is it - that is my response to what I am thankful for.  I am going to be thankful for Memories.
Thankful for the ones I have made with the ones who are gone and the ones who are still here!
Also thankful for the memories I will continue to make and be certain not to let an opportunity for a memory making moment pass me by because we never know when that memory is all we will have!

xoxo,
Faith