thank you notes 12/6
i'm thankful for how beautiful the sky in the east was this morning when i left for work. i'm thankful for the way that, when i first saw it, riding down our driveway, it was almost painfully oversaturated in broad streaks of pink and purple. i'm thankful that there was no other traffic on the quiet street downtown i use to get to campus, so i could look off into the distance at the sky the whole time, trying to soak up the color with my gaze. i'm thankful, as i turned into the parking lot of the building where i work a few minutes later and, coming over a hill after my view had been blocked briefly, got my last look up, for how the color at the center had changed to a softer shade of peach, the edges were already beginning to fade away into the rest of the sky. i'm thankful that i've expressed thanks for the beauty of the morning sky before, but i'm thankful to be thankful every time i get to experience it again, for the tiny lift it gives.
i'm thankful that i stopped at the grocery store on my way home solely for the purpose of buying american cheese, only to realize, when i got home, that we already had american cheese. i'm thankful for the wikipedia entry on american cheese, which includes this passage: "today’s american cheese is, by law, required to be manufactured from at least 2 types of cheese. because its manufacturing process differs from "unprocessed"/raw/natural cheeses,[1] american cheese can not be legally sold under the name (authentic) "cheese" in the us. instead, federal (and even some state) laws mandate that it be labeled as "processed cheese" if simply made from combining more than one cheese,[2] or "cheese food" if dairy ingredients such as cream, milk, skim milk, buttermilk, cheese whey, or albumin from cheese whey are added.[3] as a result, sometimes even the word "cheese" is absent, altogether, from the product's labeling in favor of, e.g., "american slices" or "american singles". in the united kingdom, packs of individually wrapped slices are labeled as "singles",[4] although they are commonly referred to as "cheese slices.""
i'm thankful for the dartboard i got for christmas, which i think is my favorite gift. i'm thankful to get to throw the darts without having to deal with our town's obnoxious frat boys and the fear that i am going to be punctured either by their darts or their judgement. i'm thankful to compete only with myself, which is not the kind of competition that makes me feel bad or angry or jealous. i'm thankful that the darts have perhaps the most simple, meditative core loop of any game i've played. i'm thankful that i think the game may be slightly improving my ability to do math in my head (i'm thankful for any improvement in that department). i'm thankful for when i get a double and thankful for when i get a triple and thankful for when i hit the number i am intending to hit, or even the number next to it. i'm thankful that i still haven't hit the inner ring of the bullseye, because of the way that it will feel that much more valuable to me when i eventually do. i'm thankful for all the tiny holes i am putting in the wall of the back bedroom of our rental house, which will lead to me learning useful home repair skills later this year.
i'm thankful that they are using some kind of new cleaning product in all the bathrooms at work and that it smells powerfully of big league chew (i'm thankful it smells like the original bubble flavor, though i'm thankful for my favorite flavor, green apple)(i'm thankful that i did not get addicted to chewing tobacco because of my love of this candy in my youth and that candy cigarettes never tasted very good to me). i'm thankful, thinking of that, to remember my friend d in college, who would come over to our house to play stoned mario kart/party but who had, in his summer sandals, very smelly feet which my roommate j referred to as "cheeto feet." i'm thankful to remember the ritual of purification we observed each time he visited, in which j would insist on spraying down his feet with a bottle of organic windex before he would allow him into the house. i'm thankful for the good naturedness with which d took this indignity, for the fact that i think he almost kind of enjoyed it.
i'm thankful for the nonchalance of the large naked man who was standing over the trash can in the bathroom at the gym today at lunch, towelling himself with sheet after sheet of rough industrial paper towels from the dispenser. i'm thankful for the surprising grace with which he leaned slightly away as i reached by him to dry my hands.
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