Lord, Don’t Let Me Be Someone Who Tosses You a Yearly Grunt of Gratitude Says Dr. David R. Mains


Recently my wonderful daughter-in-law Angela asked if I could pick up her children, ages 8 and 10, from school when their classes were dismissed. Later in the afternoon she would drop off the third child, age 5, by the house.

Angela is the widow of our son Jeremy, who died several years back from aggressive lymphoma, or cancer. She has her hands full. Not only does she work full-time, she is also close to getting her doctorate in adult learning. So I am always happy to help out.

At the appointed time, Eliana and Nehemiah tossed their book bags in the car, hopped in themselves and promptly announced they were hungry. “Tell me what you want and Papa (that’s me) will get it for you,” I replied.

Eliana, the oldest, had a hankering for a cinnamon pretzel. There’s a shop that sells them a few blocks from the school, and what she wanted looked huge in the glass case. I should have given the price tag of $4.00! Nehemiah’s request was for a Blue Ice. “Where do I get that?” I asked. “My friend got one over by the Steak and Shake,” he answered.

“Which Steak and Shake?” I asked. “There are more than one.”

“The one over by the place where they sell the Blue Ices!”

I need to learn to ask better questions!

While Eliana worked her way through the monster cinnamon-pretzel and decided she was now also thirsty, I said that we could get her something to drink at the Blue Ice place that was near the Steak and Shake where I was headed … and luckily, I chose the right one.

The Blue Ice turned out to be a half a cup of shaved ice with some kind of blue syrup (?) for $2.50. That plus a drink for Eliana made me aware that the $10 bill I had started out with was now close to being gone.

As we started toward home, maybe it was thinking about the money that prompted me to say, “I think you both forgot to say something!”

“We both got what we wanted. What did we forget?”

[LONG PAUSE]

“When Papa buys you what you want, aren’t you supposed to say something?”

“Ohthankyou”—two voices in unison and said very quickly, but with almost no feeling whatsoever.

Later, when Anelise was dropped off she discovered to her dismay that she had missed out on a Blue Ice. That’s what she now wanted more than anything else in the whole world. And there went the last of my $10, plus all the loose change in my pocket. But Anelise didn’t say “Thank you, Papa” either.

Now, I know for a fact that Angela is a very good mother, and that she has taught her children to say thank you, and they often display the results of exceptional parenting. But somehow the thank-you lesson had temporarily escaped them!

As my three youngest grandchildren grow into adulthood, will they in time learn to be truly grateful? Probably. I certainly hope so. But if they are at all like I am, they will constantly have to work at it. That’s because my experience tells me that it is easier to take for granted what we have, and to gripe about what we don’t, than it is to live in a constant attitude of gratitude.


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