Patricia Cummings, quilt historian, photo taken 2009
Develop the habit of gratitude for individuals who touch your life. We are here only a short time. It is difficult to be thankful for difficult people. Yet, they help us to grow and to define the person we want to be. They can shake up our thoughts, and that is good. They can make us more responsible, and make us strive to be more, and to do more, ourselves.
In today’s world, there is a lot of disrespect. Kids in public school think nothing of swearing at their teachers. People who should know better send business correspondence addressed only with a last name. Whatever happened to “Mr. and Mrs.?” Everyone looks out for #1, “me, myself, and I.”
Business is a cut-throat deal as magazines and newspapers deal with a dwindling readership while many former readers turn to the Internet for news and information. Print materials are quickly becoming like dinosaurs, and their pages are becoming thinner and thinner. New devices, like Kindle, are being developed as an alternative way to read a book.
“Please” and “thank you” are also becoming archaic remnants of the past. America is becoming a country of “no manners.” The individual is not honored, unless there is a way for an organization to make money from the work of that person. Even then, honor cannot be expected. There is no honor for the sake of honor, except perhaps to those stalwart men and women who are serving this country with honor in the Armed Services. Yet, veterans come home to what? Have we become ungrateful even to those who keep us safe from harm?
The rude and the bizarre and the untrue are celebrated. To be a celebrity, one often has to be a freak, dressing weirdly and drug-addicted.
A laurel wreath is placed on the heads of people who dishonor scholarship by not imparting true information. The untrue is upheld. The truth becomes non-true in the double-speak of academia. A blind eye is turned towards actual facts in a world of talking heads who have to maintain that they are right, even when they are dead wrong.
This behavior is but a reflection of society as a whole, where mediocrity is what is valued most. Gifted children are shuffled off to the side to fend for themselves because, it is reasoned, they will make it in the world, anyhow. So, more money and time is spent on the challenged, the lazy, and those who expect to be given an “A” for “D” work.
On the home front, if someone goes to the trouble to cook a meal, be grateful for it. Don’t tell the hard-working cook that you would rather have “take-out.” That is an insult, and is insensitive, crude, and low-brow. Holier than thou people could take a lesson in civility. Cooking for someone or performing any work in the home is a labor of love, not to be taken for granted.
ALL work has intrinsic value whether it is done by a street sweeper, a hamburger flipper, or a trash collector. Everyone is needed in society, and while some jobs, particularly human services, pay very little, compared to more high falutin’ positions with big titles and big money, the work of everyone is valuable. No person is “better” than anyone else, either by their looks, their youth, or their station in life. We are all equal under heaven.
Look around today and be aware of just how much other people do for you, and in your heart, replace your sneers and your looking-down-your-nose attitude with a profound sense of gratitude. None of us is better than the least among us. Everyone deserves respect, freedom from want, and an appreciation of their service.
In one lifetime, there is always too little love.
Patricia Cummings
owner, Quilter’s Muse Publications
Tags: Gratitude
Amen to this! And shame on all of us (especially those of us who live in this richly-blessed country) for not being more appreciative of all we have been given.