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Thankful/Grateful?

As Thanksgiving approaches, I’ve been thinking about the distinction between being thankful and grateful. On one level, they may seem interchangeable – and in fact, I have probably often used them that way. On the other, there is a difference and understanding that distinction may be the key to feeling both.

In short, it appears that feeling thankful is ”typically a more immediate and situational response to a specific benefit, whereas gratitude is a deeper, more profound, and lasting attitude of appreciation.”

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Locked-In

I recently watched the film Deliver Me from Nowhere, which chronicled a specific period in Bruce Springsteen’s life. He was on the cusp of super stardom. He had his first “hit” and was coming off a successful tour. While his music label was anxious to capitalize and pushed Springsteen to make something commercial, he instead retreated into a small rental home in Jersey, close to where he grew up.

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Learning

I started my class late yesterday to allow my students more time to register for their spring classes. The process is typically chaotic with most not getting the classes they need.

I use the word “need” because most of the classes are requirements and depressingly is consistent with their response to this question I asked them: “Do any of you have any classes you’re really looking forward to taking in the spring?”…


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Assistance

When I was younger, I benefitted directly from food stamps. My mom was raising three children on her own off of wages and tips earned from her job as a bartender. There was also a period when she was battling cancer and could earn no money at all.

Even then as a small boy, I felt the stigma of receiving food stamps; recalling specific times when I was told we couldn’t have a specific food item because we either couldn’t afford it or it wasn’t covered.…


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Powerful

It is understandable that many feel powerless today amidst the chaos and calamity found in headlines. At the same time, in many different ways. our everyday actions can be quite powerful – if we choose them to be.

On the very crowded 6 yesterday, a woman struggled to get onto the packed subway car. She asked her fellow passengers to move in. The person immediately in front of her tried to accommodate but could not move in enough to let her board the train.

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Desire

Last week, I was listening to a podcast about debt. While the host and guest talked about debt in the traditional sense – mortgage, loans, credit cards and negative bank balances – I was most struck by what they called invisible debt. Debt caused not by spending too much but by wanting more. It is a debt driven by desire and social comparison.

The premise of the discussion was trying to unravel the contradiction between the fact that Americans are on average both wealthier and unhappier than their counterparts living in comparable parts of the world.…


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Meaningful

A few weeks ago, I was watching TV with my youngest daughter. A commercial came on for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. At the end, they asked for a recommended donation of $20 a month to support a child struggling with cancer. My daughter matter-of-factly asked me if we already support one of their patients. I told her we don’t but that we sponsor four other children through different organizations and have been sponsoring kids since before she was born.…


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Pass

At lunch on Tuesday, I received an email from Ethan Hawke’s agent. They were passing on the screenplay I pitched to them.

After dinner that same night, I received an email from a literary agent. They were passing on a non-fiction book proposal I had shared.

Passing is a kinder, more gentle term for rejection. Yet it still stings all the same. The number of times someone has passed on a project, proposal, pitch, or offer I’ve shared is innumerable.

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Believing

My heart was full. I looked out at a sea of smiling second graders. I was returning to the school district that many years ago taught me how to read, write and do arithmetic. I was now there to read my own children’s book, America Gives Thanks, and for this full circle moment I felt so incredibly blessed.

Like I did at their age, almost all of these students live in a low-income household.

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Admirable

In class this week, I asked fifteen college students to write down the names of three people in the world they admired but that they didn’t know personally. Two things struck me. One, almost everyone struggled to come up with three names. Two, no person was mentioned twice.

This inquiry was spurred on from a conversation I had the previous night with a friend. We similarly struggled to find what would be today’s equivalent of Gandhi, Mandela, RBG, Mother Theresa, Eisenhower, Churchill, MLK, and Rosa Parks.…


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Readers

The world could use more readers like Jack.

Jack was a young boy who bounded into Politics and Prose last weekend while I was doing a reading and signing. His energy and enthusiasm for books was infectious. He had purchased, read and enjoyed America Gives Thanks previously and was now coming in to have it signed. He scurried around the store picking up book after book, exclaiming loudly for all to hear why each “looked good.”…


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Light

Two of my favorite books, All The Light We Cannot See and The Unbearable Lightness of Being have light in their titles. I can still remember all the words to my favorite song, This Little Little of Mine from church when I was a little kid. All ruminate on the need to see, feel, act and share light.

These reminders are in contrast to our lives, which can often feel heavy or even dark.…


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Harvest

Fall is upon us. It brings with it both excitement and trepidation. The first day of school is exciting. The anticipation of the school work, trepidation. Luscious colors will figment leaves and then eventually fall and be in need of raking. It is a season of transition and, as such, one naturally beset with the yin and yang of daily life.

It is perhaps my favorite season.…


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Eden

A wise friend recently reminded me of the absurdity of the Garden of Eden story. Two people are in paradise. They have a bounty of food, are surrounded by endless beauty, and perhaps most importantly, have the companionship and love of one another. And yet, it is not enough.

It is an apt metaphor for the state we often find ourselves in today. Most of us are blessed to have enough of what we need – someone who loves us, food on the table and more than enough beauty in the world to go around.…


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Hoarding

While aimlessly clicking through the channels, we stumbled upon the show Hoarders: Buried Alive and found ourselves rubbernecking. Wanted to drive by faster and on to the next station but unable to peel our eyes away from this personal disaster.

In the show, extreme hoarders are literally buried in their own home. Unable to navigate from room to room, possessions buried under possessions. Infestations of material accumulation co-mingling with excrement from both pets and pests.

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Breeze

I received an email Tuesday morning. It was from my editor wishing me a Happy Book Birthday and telling me to “soak it all in.”

I struggled to do that all day. While I wanted to focus on what should be a very cool experience, I found it difficult to let go of everything else going on in my life. All the other emails needing my attention, a to-do list that never seems to get shorter, kids who want rides, a dog who needs walking – let alone all of what is happening in the world.…


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Birthdays

Friday was our dog Scout’s birthday. He turned nine. In “people years” he is almost a senior citizen – although he still often acts like a puppy.

I learned recently that the smaller the animal, the slower time moves for them. This partly explains why it’s so challenging to swat a fly. You are moving in slow motion to them.

Each day, a staggering 70,000 puppies are born in the United States.…


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Summer

It’s hard to believe it’s almost August. Summer is already on the backstretch.

Before this season of relaxation and restoration began, I made a list. A plan of sorts about how I would use all the time freed up from teaching and coaching obligations to achieve an ideal summer. It included taking up biking, getting in ten rounds of golf and a couple of tennis games, playing the guitar more often, teaching myself piano and going on a family vacation.…


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Real

As I sat outside drinking my morning coffee, reading Lydia Millet’s wonderful book, We Loved it All, I was so struck by a passage that I took a picture of it for safe keeping and read it aloud to those sitting with me.

“Happiness is a wavering mirage that shimmers on the horizon, a promise of sudden deliverance that supports the passive attendance of our lives.…


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Connections

On my walk to our local library to write this, a stranger stopped me, noticing the logo on my t-shirt. “Penn State, I grew up and went there. You?” I confirmed I did and what ensued was a genuinely nice five minute conversation about our experiences in Happy Valley. We exchanged pleasantries and names and a connection based on an institution two hundred-fifty miles away and a time decades earlier was made.…


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Rollercoasters

“That was everything I wasn’t expecting.”

Those were the first words my daughter uttered after getting off The Lock Ness Monster rollercoaster last week. Her face reflected the familiar residuals of joy, thrill, and terror.

We had just arrived at the theme park and remarkably there was no line. So we threw caution to the wind and jumped on without noticing the multiple vertical loops and steep drops.…


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History

You’ve probably heard the phrase, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” It is attributed to the philosopher George Santayana.

While this may be true, I believe there is another less dire and more wonderful reason to study history – it expands our appreciation, awe and wonder with our present world.

Consider that everything around you right now has an origin – a beginning of its history.…


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Bonds

Thanks to all of you who became my first paid subscribers last week. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your support. For others who find these notes to be a helpful and valuable way to start your week, I hope you might consider doing the same.

Moving Up Mondays is a reader-supported publication. If you value these words, please consider becoming a paid subscriber using this link:

Now on to this week’s post….…


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Coffee?

On my way to the library where I often work, I stop to get a cup of coffee from the local diner. I could easily bring coffee from home, but I enjoy the ritual of stopping by. The coffee is great. I enjoy saying hi to the people working there. A few dollars is well worth the price to support the people and business that help me start my day.

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Weather

This morning I read a story about Captain James Stagg, the chief meteorological advisor to General Eisenhower and the man responsible for making the “go” or “no go” call for the invasion of Normandy. As the article lays out it was an incredibly complex decision not merely dependent on “good weather” on the day of the invasion but required various favorable conditions related to visibility, low tides, phase of the moon, and wind speeds over the course of multiple days.…


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