A Real Thanksgiving

On Thanksgiving Day around noon, Chico and I, finding the preparations for the festivities well in hand, headed down to the beach to allow the cooks room to express their creativity, and to enjoy the day.  It was there on the beach, for that sun-drenched hour of wind and crashing surf, that I truly had Thanksgiving. 

We walked and sat on the beach grass, then walked some more.  I agreed to spend extra time on the beach given the beautiful nature of the day, and he agreed to spend less time trying to sneakily unearth and eat mummified, sand-encrusted and spawned out salmon (which is probably exactly what he is doing in the photo above).

All the while I thought about all the things I had to be thankful for (I'm not sure what he was thinking about, but it probably involved food or chasing foxes, his two primary obsessions - or perhaps I should give him more credit, he may have been pondering the very same things as I .  . . )

In no particular order, and doubtless with many ommissions, these are a few of the things I silently gave thanks for that morning on the beach.  My loving wife and best friend who was back on the house pouring her heart into making the Thanksgiving meal as perfect as possible - I really can't say enough about her and definitely don't deserve her; my parents, who always encouraged my hobbies and interests, and instilled in me a blue collar work ethic that has always served me well; my sons - I am so proud of the young men they have become, so intelligent, interesting, hard-working, honest and kind-hearted; my brother, always doing everything a little bit better than I do, setting such a great example of what it means to be a man, always there for everyone in the family; my older sister who stepped up when my Mom passed away and worries about us all like a surrogate mother hen - such an amazing mother in her own right, teacher and friend; my baby sister, who is like a beautiful, wild, mysterious creature that I don't fully understand yet love unconditionally; my friends - friends on the island that make me laugh and are there for me always, friends I have met over the years on-line yet never met who are just as there for me, friends who touched my life briefly and lost touch, friends from around the world who are always welcome in my home.

I'm thankful to have a good job in today's economy, for a company that is doing something important.  I love the fishing industry - when I was a deckhand on a salmon gillnetter, it felt wonderful to pick those shiny sockeyes and cohos from the net and carefully layer them in ice, brailer after brailer, getting dog tired but feeding people.  I worked processing black cod in Nikiski, herring in Bristol Bay, and now out here in the Aleutians, the grand daddy fishery of them all, where boats pull up to the dock with a million pounds of pollock at a time.  Crab gets all the press, but it is pollock that pays the bills, and for the bill paying I am thankful.

I am thankful for these United States of America, most especially the great states of Maine and Alaska where I have spent the majority of my 47 years.  Both states have been good to me - Maine was a wonderful place to grow up, and living in Alaska for almost 23 years has been wonderful, giving me more to be thankful for everytime I look out the window.

There is, of course, a lot more to mention but I'm going to get this posted as I have several more posts in my head I need to get out!  Cheers everyone!