It IS here already, Thanksgiving 2013!  Whoa!  The last three years, for me, in a different country have been crazy eye opening for me as an individual, and as a newcomer to so many things that are happening on viewing my home from afar.  Without further ado – here’s my list…

I am so incredibly thankful for the family that has always supported me, inquired how I am, and continues to do so.

I am thankful for realizing that visiting sites on giving is much better than visiting sites on where to shop for Thanksgiving.

I am thankful for the amazing Father that always role modeled for me without saying a word, taught me what it meant to give even when the odds were not in your favor.

I am thankful for a Mother who stayed the course through the toughest of times and refused to give up!

I am thankful for the friends I made at Slippery Rock – and the amazing quality education and array of professors, experiences, and opportunities that opened doors wherever I went.

I am thankful for the amazing friends I had made at US Investigations, we had a special turkey one year, for the whole upper floor office, it was amazing and a treasured memory of mine.

I am so thankful to have been familiar with Pittsburgh as a city of my family, to be a Steeler, and to be able to follow them from before I can remember to now, when I still have problems remembering.

I am so thankful for the chance to be given a shot back in education, hence I would have never met the amazing Cross Country athletes that would give it their all, as well as the members of the Aloha Yearbook, Key Club, Relay for Life, and my colleagues that always supported me through all.  It made the toughest of times and decisions so much easier.

The amazing friends I left behind in DE, yet still are a part of what I do in everyday practice, you are the reason I am here today!

I am thankful for the amazing Repentino. staff I stumbled on as I came into a new country three years ago, and realized, I had lost a major part of my family in Seaford, DE, and all of the Repentino. staff made me feel at home from the very beginning, and continue to show they are not afraid to make changes that will impact the world, and the use of the word through art.

The amazing friends I have made while being at ASF – they have supported me, through tough and easy times, as well we just acquainting me with the changes that continue to occur in a country very different than the one I was taught it was in the states.

I am thankful for a home I can come back to and relax and veg all day and love to in that very apartment, the dogs that at first were a nightmare to maintain and now have become my family, the cats that were lost and have welcomed be every day I return at the end of a good/bad day, and the opportunity to understand another way of life, be it here in Mexico, be it in being able to travel to New York to experience new trends and methods, and having the freedom to think, read, and complain.

I am so thankful for friends that have enabled me to haver a turkey dinner today, and celebrate these major and minor aspects of what has led up to 2013.

I am so thankful that I can have the option of traveling when I want, or not at all, and seeing so much within a few blocks of my apartment, this city is amazing!

I am thankful for each one of you who has made this blog the success it has become, and supporting it with your ideas, suggestions, and offerings.

I am so thankful that I kept pursuing the things I thought were unobtainable, and then, without realizing it, a lightbulb would go off at the end, when I very least expected it! – This applies to my studies, National Novel Writing Month, and so much more.

I am thankful that I often have spare change that can be offered up for those that need it…

and now a small anecdotal story before I  leave you on your turkey football/family day!

I went into Papa Guapa yesterday. because I heard so much about it from my Dean at Upper School.  LOVED the old school, old style everything resembling the old-style kitchen, old style soda fountain bar, Hitchcock movie, everything.  Yet, not was early, kind of empty, and the waitress was not having a good experience.  I walked in, and they just let me kind of go, they were really just “whatever” that I was there, and the waitress through several comments just lightly made, rolls of the eye, etc could care less that I was there. (I get that a lot).  But this was the first time it occurred in a restaurant, and I felt uncomfortable.  I made as little of a hassle as possible, ordering quickly, as I truly felt as if I was a bother.  I order an amazing mushroom potato, (The papa Barlot) a thick fresa milkshake, and a Coke.  It seems as if the waitress was slowly becoming cordial, but that was just losing the eye rolls and glances away.  When I was ready, I left, (which I normally would not) a 30 pesos tip making it like a 20% tip above the total – and on a hunch, it did open her day up, she squeezed her eyes at me like as in a wink LOL, and was super happy, and it seemed to snap her into a much better mood!

Normally, there would have been no call to give someone that made you feel like you were an inconvenience a large tip, right?  But how often are we abel to take ourselves out of our own feelings and put ourselves into another’s despite how we are treated?  For me, very little if at all.  However, I would go back to Papa Guapa in a heartbeat as even I felt better as I walked out the door and helped improve the mood and outlook of someone else – which if I was and everyone was able to do more, these mini-Thanksgivings would change a lot in the world!

Thank you.  😉