Sweeping Up Gratitude

First course of a simple, home cooked Thanksgiving meal at Brent and Heidi's house

We felt blessed having oldest son Brad from Pittsburgh join us for a Thanksgiving gathering yesterday with second son Brent, his wife Heidi and our three local grandchildren ages four, seven and nine. Our conversations were free of political or other debates and we avoided football and other media entertainment altogether. Just being together was entertainment enough.

After a leisurely and delicious meal together I made the mistake of telling the youngest grandson about a silly, made-up game that was popular at our house when our sons--his dad and his uncle--were about four and six, one we called "Sweep up the Person!".

To play, I would pretend to be a powerful, giant vacuum cleaner, and they were to find and touch the right "switch" to turn it (me) on, that being some body part like my nose, forehead, ear, elbow, knee, etc. When the right "button" was pushed, I would pursue the button pusher with a mighty roar and draw him fiercely close to me in a big squeeze (Daughter Joanna, who came almost eight years later and who with her husband and three children now lives eight hours away, got in on this much later).

Our four-year-old grandson found this game endlessly fascinating and fun, and almost wore his grandfather out with repeated requests for "Sweep up the Person!" The element of suspense, coupled with the fun of the chase and the joy of being wrapped up in a big grandfather hug combined to keep us occupied for quite some time.

Proves that the funnest things in life really are mostly free, gifts for which we can only say "Thank you, Thank you, Thank you".

God is good. And every expression of gratitude is a prayer.

Photo by Brad.