The World We Live In

This being the week of Thanksgiving and all, no better time to appreciate what I got. I’m thankful for so very much but sometimes I get lost and caught up in what I want, where the deficits in my life are, and focus on all the wrong things. So today I’m going to focus on how grateful I am to live in the world we do.

When my daughter turns eighteen, she will be given the right to vote. In my life of shuffling my kids around and balancing them through experiences that are not kid friendly, I found myself stressed about getting to the polls. I was uptight about how they would handle themselves. And I brushed through the voting process with a desire to quickly get my vote in. What I forgot was that years ago, women were not allowed to have this opportunity. We not only live in a world where my daughter and I can vote, but rather that we never even think about that as a luxury. We expect that we should be voters because the world has evolved so much that someday we will see a woman president. Thank you U S of A!!!

My son goes to a school where he has the chance to learn about our religion, as well as his ABCs. Knock on wood, we have never had to abandon our homes, our families, or our lives in fear of persecution for practicing our religion. In our neighborhood there are abundance of different schools we can go to, camps to spend our summers at, and religious institutions to join. When I go to stores in my neighborhood I can buy candles for my Chanukah menorah, challah for my Friday night Shabbat dinners and matzah for my Passover observance. I’m grateful to live in a world where I can practice my family’s beliefs and customs.

I’m so thankful that I was brought into a family that has afforded me so many opportunities. I was able to go to college, travel the world, be a business person, stay at home raising my children and participate in countless activities that have shaped me. Now that I have been able to bring children into the world, I am committed to affording them the same (if not more) opportunities that my parents and ancestors (be it George Washington or Anne Frank) have given me.

It’s so easy to get caught up in the bad things about the world we live in. Today I am thankful for all the wonderful things about this world. In the famous words of the aforementioned Anne Frank, “I don’t think of all the misery but of the beauty that still remains.”