I read once that we often take for granted the things that deserve our gratitude the most. Perhaps that is especially true at this Thanksgiving time of year.

If this is so, then I should be grateful for the beauty of the sunrise that surrounds me on my drive through the countryside early every weekday morning. The horizon is quite awesome when I take the time to notice the silhouetted landscape that’s there just at daybreak. Too often I am enjoying my coffee and my quiet in the car to take the notice I should, I’m afraid.

That time of day when everything is either black or gray, framed against the backdrop of a muted sky, is rather magical. Have you ever noticed?

We take for granted our food. On a daily basis here in the heartland, the food we have to eat is plentiful, varied, and of good quality. Most of the people in the world don’t even get to eat regularly like we do, and yet somehow we think it’s okay to be picky about what is placed before us. Try spending some time in a middle school cafeteria and you’ll appreciate what I mean.

It’s the same for the water we have to drink, which flows so easily when all we have to do is turn a faucet. Not so for much of the world’s population.

Have you ever considered the technology we take for granted? I hope we are thankful for the speed and ease we can communicate with others, but it’s so easy to complain about how slow the Internet may be or why we can’t have the latest and fastest electronic gadget. How spoiled we are. It is easy to take this for granted, but-in spite of its occasional frustrations–I am thankful for the technology that allows me to so easily keep in touch with my family, regardless of how far apart we are physically.

And I am thankful that technology makes it so easy for me to write. What If I had to do it using a typewriter or even by longhand?

It’s so easy to take our friends and our families for granted, yet I hope we are truly thankful for the many ways our people enrich our lives. It is a true blessing in good times as well as when life isn’t easy. What would we do without them?

Sadly, it’s so easy to take good health for granted. If we feel good and can do what we want when we want, then should truly be thankful for the blessing of our good health.

“We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.” Thornton Wilder