Thank you!

The best thank you I ever received came from one of my sons when he was about five years-old.
At a garage sale, under a table of slightly worn clothes I saw a perfectly good pair of child-size cowboy boots. No price tag.
It was late in the day. I turned to the seller, “How much for these?
“Oh, a quarter,” she yawned.
I decided my five-year-old might want to pretend he was a cowboy once in a while.
I tossed them in the car with the other items I had purchased at garage sales that morning and headed home.
I had lots of help hauling my ‘finds’ into the house. My elementary-aged children acted like it was Christmas without all the trimmings.
I handed the boots to the five-year-old. “Here try these on for size. I thought maybe you would …” I never finished.
“Thank you, Mom. Thank you!” he yelled as he grabbed the boots, shoved his feet in them and pronounced, “They fit. Thanks, Mom, it’s just what I wanted.”
He did not just wear his cowboy boots pretending to be a cowboy. He decided “these boots are made for walking and walking’s what they’ll do.” He wore the soles of those boots all the way through.
The boots wore out, but the memory of his uninhibited, spontaneous “thank you” will always be with me.
I wish I could have been as un-inhibited on my 15th wedding anniversary.
Our simple wedding 15 years before did not include a reception with a decorated cake. My husband decided to amend that.
He took me out for dinner. When the waitress served dessert, it was a multi-tiered decorated cake he had secretly brought to the restaurant in the back of the van. The waitresses had brought a knife, forks and plates. I was very pleased, but felt very conspicuous as the other diners stared at me and my huge cake.
I did not cut the cake and share it. I wanted out of there and I wanted that cake. And, everybody knows, “You can’t have your cake and eat it, too.”
I had my cake. I rode in the backseat staring at it all the way home. I left it in the middle of the dining room table to admire for a couple days, refusing to let anyone touch it.
If I could have, I would have worn that cake out by staring at it. Once I cut it and served the first piece, it vanished as my children helped me eat it.
If, after all this time, my husband still thinks I took his gift for granted, “Thanks! It was just what I wanted.”
As we take time to be thankful for the things we have taken for granted, or for blessings we have that we have “always wanted,” also look around for items you never considered before.
Like the Thanksgiving we each took a turn praying around the table. The kindergartner mumbled his thanks, ending with “Thank you for the walls, Amen.”
I looked at him questioningly, “The walls?”
He reached for the rolls. “Yep, they hold the ceiling up.”
Of course, I just never thought about the walls that way before.
This Thanksgiving as I look around for things I take for granted, I will look for something holding up a very important part of my life.