I woke up this Thanksgiving morning and made a list of the first 100 things that came to my mind when I thought of what I’m grateful for this particular Thanksgiving 2020. Your list will not be the same. And that’s okay. HAPPY THANKSGIVING and I’m looking forward to seeing you on the other side of the pandemic.

Wife

Kids

Pixie the cat

House

Savings

Berkeley

Friendships

Doctors, nurses, and front-line workers during the pandemic

Doctorate

Ongoing Work

 

Ongoing publishing opportunities

Ongoing ability/freedom to write scripts

Ongoing time to work on some good causes, especially green causes

The people who work so hard, getting no credit, on those causes

Joe Biden’s anti-drama disposition

Great neighbors who I’m truly friends with

Social media fun

Extended family – cousins and such

November 2019 trip to Maui which has lingered well

February 2020 trip to Disneyworld which has lingered well

 

Burritos

Sushi

Indian food

Ethiopian food

Dogs, generally

My health, mostly

R’s ongoing smarts (these days, he asks for me to quiz him on division, like I’m supposed to ask “what’s 39 divided by 3?”)

R having real friends now

Entirely new electrical work/panel we paid for this year

Hot tub we got on our back porch this year (keeping Dar happy)

 

Entirely new tile floor we put in studio and laundry room this year

Solar panels we got this year

Walks in Tilden

San Francisco, generally

Scuba diving and all that is

The Nitrox scuba certificate I got this year

All the physical therapy I did this year to fix my arm – and it worked!

Any and all help with autism, including websites

Dar can swim

Although I now have tinnitus it’s not THAT bad – grateful it’s not worse

 

Word Blitz, a Boggle game I started playing this year

Thursday poker night with friends

Sunday game night (free games) with friends

The relative grace of most people during this pandemic

Hammock

Trees, including those I planted this year

Front and back garden that I planted or maintained this year

My parents and all they did to make my life so easy/lovely

The mixed-blessing luck of not having to care for a parent during the pandemic

Wife’s organizational and budget skills

 

My iPhone, generally

My new site/podcast, bestlovedfilms – it’s going well!

The NYT, the WaPo, and the WSJ (we pay for all)

Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, AppleTV, Amazon, HBOMax, Peacock (we also pay for all that, but something has to change there)

Movies, generally

Music, generally

Literature, generally

Museum-level art, generally

Studying history, generally

Red hair and red beard, cause it’s fun and not yet gray

 

Older friends, because I love connecting to the past

Melatonin – never took it before this year, it’s great!

Hot showers

Newer nature documentaries in HD

The little cylinder pillow under my pillow now

Leaf-filled branches waving in, and dappling, sunlight

Beaches near us

Getting rid of my car this year – great move! (Now we have one car, not two)

The lemons from our lemon tree

R’s dedicated teachers/school in the midst of this pandemic

 

Sleep, when it happens

Parasite winning at the Oscars, cause that was awesome

Showing certain beloved movies to R (not Parasite)

Scientists and all their hard work

This coming vaccine?!

Speaking Spanish

The NBA, especially this year

Anyone and everyone who reads this blog

My wife’s job and its flexibility

My friends’ dreams and goals

 

Laptop

Dill on fish, because you literally cannot have too much

New glasses – now I can see distances

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream before bed

White privilege

The luck that most non-whites prefer justice to revenge

Cookies

My meager cooking skills, which come in handy this week

Zoos

The National Park system

 

My mother and father and all they did

Dar’s daily therapist, she knows who she is

Dar’s psychiatrist

Dar’s teacher at his school

Dar’s neurologist

Not getting COVID, so far

Heater-warmed socks on a cold evening

Hot-water-warmed cloth on my face, anytime

Peace, love, and understanding, generally

The space and time to do things like write this list on Thanksgiving morning