Time for Thanks

‘Tis the season for school assignments asking students what they are thankful for in their life. My son came home with just such an assignment and it made me think about what I was thankful for this year. It wasn’t hard to come up with an answer. It’s been a good year.

I am thankful for words. Some days, I struggle with them, but no matter how difficult they are to wrangle, they are always there filling my head. Night. Day. Doesn’t matter. I love the way they sound when I speak them aloud and the way they flit through my brain as I write, often surprising me.

I am thankful for books. I love to read and it’s been a great year for it. In fact, I’ll soon be posting a list of my recent reads in the Book Love section. I’m going to include books that spoke to me as a writer, highlighting what appealed to me in that context. It’s amazing how good the books have been this year.

I am thankful to have this blog. This is my way of giving back to my industry. I love writing and sharing my passion with others is fantastic. It feels good pouring out the lessons I’ve learned and sending them out into the ether, hoping they find readers and are helpful.

I am thankful for writing. I love spending my day stringing letters together to form words and sentences. It always amazes me that twenty-six tiny scribbles can create worlds and capture the human experience, and how they take on different lives depending on who wields them.

I am thankful for librarians and teachers. They have helped me throughout my career. It started when I took an AP English class with Mr. Clark in high school. He had us do a year-long research scavenger hunt. We were presented with various bits from literature or facts that needed sourcing and told to hit the library to find primary sources. No Internet. Just books and kind librarians. Since my father was stationed in Washington, DC, so I hit the Library of Congress and lost myself in the stacks (something which sadly you can no longer do). I learned so much about research that year and fell in love with the hunt for facts and wisdom.

Lastly, I am thankful for those weird, random thoughts that turn into articles, books, stories and so much more. It’s weird how inspiration works, but incredible. I love getting new ideas that fling me down the rabbit hole of research and writing. There’s nothing quite like it.

What about you? What are you thankful for?