As autumn deepens once again, it seems natural to count our blessings
When I was a much younger man, I wasn’t quite sure how to react when my daddy spoke often and with conviction about what a blessed man he was.
More blessed, he added, than he had any right or expectation to be.
I would look at his modest home, the economy (read “cheap”) cars he drove, and the medical issues that grew more serious with each passing year, and wonder just what blessings he was talking about.
Now, a half century later, I know exactly what the Old Man meant.
Yes, I know that Thanksgiving is a little ways in the future, but as the autumn deepens and the landscape grows more gray it seems natural to take a reckoning of where we stand and what our blessings are.
And I think this is especially true for those of us who are three-quarters home and confronted with the reality of the deepening autumn of our own lives.
The older I grow, the more convinced I am that if we think we are not blessed we are spending too much time looking in the mirror and not enough time focusing on those around us.
So… blessings to count.
My Old Man and my mother for one. A lot of folks are born in quicksand. I was born standing on a solid platform of faith, of family, and of discipline.
I am a very blessed man
My beautiful bride, for another. She sustains me and I sustain her and we grow closer and stronger with the passage of time. As Browning once wrote, “Grow old along with me; the best is yet to be.”
I am a very blessed man.
Our family, the daughters we have raised, the men they have married, and the three healthy grandsons we have been given.
I am a very blessed man.
Within the next few weeks, another precious addition to that family will arrive — our first granddaughter. She might be just a little doted over, just a little spoiled.
I am a very blessed man.
Good friends who have stood with me through fat times and lean, not the least of whom is Gazette Managing Editor Kevin Ellis. Kevin and I have been the best of pals for nearly 35 years. Not a bad track record.
I am a very blessed man.
More than 45 years of gainful employment in jobs that allow me to put to full use my talents as a writer, as an editor, and as a teacher. During those 45 years, the good times and the good people have far outweighed the bad.
I am a very blessed man.
The good health that allows me to roll out of the rack each morning with only a minimum of groaning and permits me to continue to hike the hills and mountains of western North Carolina.
I am a very blessed man.
The beauty that I find and appreciate on mountain tops, in flaming sunsets, in the sound of the ocean, and in deep and dark starry nights.
I am a very blessed man.
I’ll stop there, lest I go on to write the longest column of my career and still fall short of listing all the blessings I have been given.
And thank you, Gazette readers, for allowing me to share my thoughts and my memories, my reflections and my dreams with you each week for the past five and a half years.
That too, is a great blessing.
Bill Poteat may be reached at wlpoteat@yahoo.com.
This article originally appeared on The Gaston Gazette: As autumn deepens once again, it seems natural to count our blessings
