In the Spirit of Thanksgiving

In the Spirit of Thanksgiving\\

Clink on the link and watch the video. See if it inspires you to think on what you're thankful for - I'd like to hear about it.

In the meantime, here's my short list of things I'm thankful for:

1. Parents who love each other, love me, and did all they could (in spite of my best efforts as a teenager to make them completely and totally crazy) to give me a good start in life.

2. Children who challenge me, make me angry, make me laugh, make me worry, but overall give me every reason to be extremely proud of each one of them for the people they're becoming (in spite of my best efforts to force them into what I want them to become, which probably really isn't what they were intended to be after all).

3. A husband who loves and supports me, makes sure there's Pepsi in the refrigerator, drops me off and picks me up at the back door of the hospital so I don't have to drive in the snow, does the laundry, doesn't feel the need to thump his chest and be a big macho guy and reminds me to laugh and have fun (in spite of my best efforts to take myself too seriously).

4. A Savior, Jesus Christ, who knows my heart and loves me anyway and never gives up on me (in spite of my best efforts to be stupid and prideful).

And other miscellaneous things:

5. Chips and guacamole
6. Two water heaters - so I never run out of hot water in the shower
7. My iPod. Would I not have LOVED having one of those when I was 13?????
8. Cats who get that their purpose in my life is to sleep on my feet.
9. Happy's Chinese restaurant. A lifesaver on a Thursday night when cooking seems on the same physical effort expenditure scale as climbing Mount Everest.
10. A library card
11. Reed's Dairy milk delivery

An open letter to Mr. Charles Darwin

Dear Mr. Darwin,

I write this letter to you from a time that you - yes, even you with your wild imagination - could not even imagine. You'd be quite happy here, with all your "scientific" ideas. You would be delighted to see the rise in atheist, anti-religious views.

Yes, you'd fit right in.

I know that you are considered to be one of the brightest scientific minds of your time. Considering that you lived in a time where doctors thought that bloodletting was a good idea and Civil War medics were hacksawing off arms and legs sans anesthetic, that's not saying much. I understand that you lived in a time where science was, well, not very scientific so when you said that human beings started as sludge in the ocean and somehow miraculously grew legs and climbed out of the sea (and that by some great accident) people thought you were a genius. Brilliant. A legacy in your own time. You probably thought you were right. You probably thought you had it all figured out. I'd like to think you meant no harm.

But let me respectfully tell you, sir, that I am ticked off. You might be dead, but your crazy ideas of how we climbed out of sludge and became what we are have taken hold in the bright minds of not one - but BOTH my sons. MY sons - who are destined to be missionaries, priesthood leaders, righteous fathers in Zion, defenders of the truth.

Curse you, Charles Darwin. Curse you for confusing my sons with your silly ideas of evolution. I mean, really - where did you come up with this stuff anyway? Lizards turn into birds.....birds turn into monkeys.....monkeys turn into people.....

Heaven only knows what you thought people might turn into. I mean, it is a progression right? Perhaps we'll all be scaly, eight foot beings with two heads and three arms? (Too bad your ideas are so nuts - I could use an extra set of hands.) Or maybe we'll all look like Mr. Potato Heads with interchangeable parts. I'm an evolved being! I can take my ear off and put it where my nose should be! Look! I have eyes on the side of my head!

Or maybe you didn't think that far. Actually, you didn't think at all. You were mad at God. He took your baby. I understand that upset you - who wouldn't be upset? So you decided to eliminate God from your life, then you came up with your own hare-brained ideas of how we got here.

I wish you had kept your ideas to yourself. That's what I wish.

But, you didn't. And now I have to fight to keep any real truth in the minds of my sons. So, I will tell you that there are two things I am really looking forward to.

The first is that I want to be there to see your face when you come to a full realization of how completely, utterly, totally wrong you were.

And the second thing I'm looking forward to will follow when I give you a big piece of my mind. You want to see evolution at work? Fine. You're going to see me evolve into a great big mother bear. Prepare yourself, Mr. Darwin, because that day is coming.

And you are gonna' get it from me.