Author: Bev

Witty, early twentieth century comedian and writer, W.C. Fields said, “the best cure for insomnia is to get a lot of sleep.” Absurd, right?

Like it’s something you select from a menu, sleep isn’t so easy for some folks. It’s a bit too cavalier for me, that statement, “get some sleep.” In fact, it’s a pet peeve.

Sleep, when you can get it, is wonderful; it’s awesome, it’s even glorious. To awaken after sleeping seven, eight, or even nine hours is a marvel to some of us for whom it is on the side of rare, or an epic accomplishment.

One of the recommendations from every healthcare provider or pseudo health guru on the planet, is to sleep seven, eight or nine hours per night, for optimum health. I’ve often looked longingly at that suggestion, with hope in my heart, but dread in my head.

To those of us who suffer from or have suffered from insomnia, there is a thing called “sleep hygiene,” which is truly a hoot. It includes such helpful advice as darken the room, sleep in comfortable clothes, make sure the space is comfortable and cool, etc.

Like everyone who can’t sleep, aims for discomfort when they’re trying to fall asleep or stay asleep. Do “they” think we wear our party clothes to bed? Do we turn the heat up to 80 degrees? And, of course we turn all the lights on when we’re trying to sleep!

I’m sorry, but people who suffer from insomnia, and we truly suffer on occasion, we know all about the tricks of the trade to try to sleep. There is the lovely white noise machine, which blocks out extraneous sounds that startle awake a sensitive sleeper.

That’s me. The least little sound puts me on awake alert. It comes from self-training when I had a baby in 1990. I alerted to every peep my precious baby made. Even if I was in zombie mode, I was awake and on the job.

There are times, let me inform you, that insomnia just is. One of the most infamous things we do, is calculate like a mathematician, how many hours we might be able to achieve if we go to sleep within the next half hour. “I could possibly get four hours if I go to sleep in the next fifteen minutes.”

We know all about cutting screen time before bed, and not watching crazy stuff on television right before bed. We know all about overstimulation, and freeing our minds. Sometimes an insomniac can’t sleep because of our wiring, not because of our hygiene.

And I should talk about some of the things designed to “help” us sleep. There are the infamous pills, which seriously do drug you to sleep. But then, as with all pharmaceuticals, there are after effects which take a toll not to mention addiction for those susceptible.

There are over-the-counter type drugs, tinctures, and devices which may or may not help. Herbal drugs can help, but may be temporary or weak.

I think everybody has a sleepless night now and again. Worry or overthinking might take over when there are things in one’s life that are challenging or too much during the day and carryover into night.

However, I think that for many an insomniac, overthinking or anxiety is not the trigger for sleeplessness. Rather, it is an unknown, or elusive physiological or neurological problem.

I confess that there is an observable pattern for me. I often have a sleepless night prior to a next-day appointment of any kind. It doesn’t have to be a difficult, scary or challenging appointment, it can just be a fun thing, but one with an appointed time-frame. It’s a mental preparation thing, which is not uncharacteristic for an introvert. Has the upcoming day’s events been planned properly to achieve the most well-being?

Social media posts joke about the “3AM brain,” where you recall and review every awkward, stupid, or embarrassing mistake you’ve made in the last twenty years. Also, I have come up with many a column idea during these awake stints in the wee hours of the night. So, some good can come out of these 3AM adventures.

A positive attitude would agree with Alain de Botton, the father of emotional intelligence and practical wisdom, who said “Insomnia is the revenge of the many big thoughts one hasn’t had time to deal with during the daylight hours.” These “big thoughts” as well as dreams, can inspire creativity.

Not only is it insulting, it’s cruel for writers, or health experts to preach about how sleep deprivation is slowly killing us. Insomnia is not always self-sabotage. Finding fault with an insomniac’s lifestyle is unhelpful at the least.

Dale Carnegie, an early twentieth century pioneering father of self-help and personal development, said in essence, if you can’t sleep, get up and do something rather than lay in bed worrying about not sleeping and how bad it is for you. “It’s the worry that gets you, not the loss of sleep.” Agreed.

Sometimes insomnia is clearly related to overthinking, anxiety, and worry about “what might be.” However, there are times when insomnia just is.  Can you say, AGING!

Let’s say you’re feeling sort of sleepy, definitely tired, and the time is sufficiently right for it to be “bed time.” So, you go to bed. You curl up on your side, hug the pillow and settle into your favorite “getting ready to sleep” mode. Then you turn over onto your back and meditate, breathe deeply, pray briefly, and it happens. Your eyes pop open and suddenly your wide awake.

You’re not thinking about anything in particular. You’re not worried about tomorrow. You’re just awake, when you innocently intended to be asleep.

So, the next time somebody tells you that you need to get some sleep, reply with something like, “I will select that from tonight’s menu.” Or, say what I often say to the “have a nice day,” greeting from many a store cashier, “I’ll do my best, same to you.”

Weather events during the winter tend to capture the attention of even the most inattentive of folks. “Wither thou goest” in the winter, attention seems to follow.

I don’t know if it’s just our region that people go crazy when a winter storm is forecast, but it is a known fact that hoarding and panic buying takes place in Bedford County when snow is coming. “Milk and bread, milk and bread, milk and bread,” chant the zombies, practically running through the aisles of every store that carries food. Funny, that it’s not “fruit and veggies, fruit and veggies, fruit and veggies.”

It’s truly apocalyptic and down-right nuts around here when it’s about to snow. Stay home if you don’t want to confront the crazies.

You’ve probably heard that there are from over a dozen to fifty or even seventy Eskimo words for snow, considering the several Eskimo languages. Believe it or not, one of their descriptors is, “wet snow.”

Here in Pennsylvania, we often have wet snow because humidity is part of our weather repertoire. If you’re familiar with manually shoveling the white stuff, you know how difficult it is to shovel wet snow. It’s packed with moisture and it’s heavy. You have trouble getting the stuff off of your shovel and you might as well call it sticky snow. I wonder if the Eskimo’s have sticky snow.

Now and again we also have powdery or dry snow. I think the skiing industry calls it fresh powder when they have natural snow, freshly fallen from the sky. It’s light and easy to shovel, in fact it’s a pleasure to shovel for those of us who have shoveled our driveways or walkways for the exercise of it. You pick it up into your shovel and it almost flies away in the cold breeze when you toss it.

Like many of you, I watch the weather on an app on my cell phone. When reporting the temperature, it now differentiates between the actual weather and the “feels like” weather. I think that’s sort of new, I don’t recall always seeing that distinction.

At any rate, “feels like” temperatures factor in the wind and how it affects how we feel the temperature. I like that the weather considers our feelings, how about you?

Wind is a funny thing, not ha-ha funny, but peculiar. I had a Persian (Iranian) friend who despised wind. He found it to be creepy, almost evil. I’m reminded of the cyclone from the Wizard of Oz that starts the movie and sets the scary tone.

Wind can be scary. I wonder if the instability in the atmosphere which causes wind might be responsible for our fear responses to wind. Instability and unpredictability seem to go hand in hand and neither are conducive to peace of mind.

Whether you like winter weather or summer weather or you prefer one of the introductory seasons, spring or autumn, you are bound to have an opinion about the weather. We all do.

The weather is well known to be a top “ice-breaker” and conversation starter in both social and professional settings. The biggest reason for this is that the weather is a non-political and universal experience. You simply can’t go wrong with, “so how about this weather?” It’s a safe, shared, relatable and neutral topic for conversation. Everyone has an opinion.

So, “wither thou goest, I will go,” – taken completely out of context from the Bible – the weather will comply. Just like you carry your soul, your habits, your personality, your traumas, your intellect, your attitude, and your spirit, with you wherever you go, you meet the weather there too. You can’t get away from the weather.

Weather is just something you have to adapt to. You have to go with it. You know the saying, “if you can’t beat em, join em?” Well, this is my acceptance of the weather, whatever it is. I often force myself to go outdoors and join the weather. I decided long ago not to fight the weather, I can’t beat it.

Winter does not come in around here like a whisper. You know that Pennsylvania is the home of the weather predicting groundhog? He, I believe it is always a he, but I could be wrong, tells us via his behavior and his shadow, whether we will have six more weeks of winter or not. So, on Monday February 2^nd this year, Punxsutawney Phil will or will not see his shadow and we will know without a doubt if we must contend with more or less winter.

Like it or not, we sort of need moisture as parts of our back yard resemble a dried up tundra. We haven’t had enough rain and up until now, snow has been negligible this year. So a thaw in a few weeks, is kind of a needed weather event.

You’ve surely heard someone say about common conundrums, “we’re all in the same boat.” I recently came across a neat story about the storms of life. In essence, we all face the same storms, but we’re not in the same boat. Some people have access to a yacht, others have motor boats, row boats, or no boat.

We face the weather with varying resources such as wealth, want, willpower, weakness, or words of authority such as “storm, be still.” The point is, lets exercise compassion toward our fellow humans as to how we each cope with the storms that hit us all.

We’ve all heard someone say, “I’m so depressed today.” In fact, 1960s and 70s singer, Karen Carpenter sang, “rainy days and Mondays always get me down.” Having the odd down day is a true fact for nearly everybody on the planet. It’s normal to get the blues sometimes.

It couldn’t be a more normal response to distressing life circumstances, than to feel sadness, grief or loss. Most of us probably succumb to mood swings related to the varying seasons of life, including the weather.

I don’t care too much for rainy days, but my husband loves them. To some of us, Mondays are daunting, triggering the beginning of “responsibilities,” while others see Mondays as a new beginning and challenge to “get er done.”

“Sunday Night Disorder,” isn’t an official psychological diagnosis, but it is a widespread phenomenon of unease associated with anticipating stress concerning upcoming workweek tasks. While in school, I recall dreading Sunday nights, already fearing that I wouldn’t remember my locker combination, or experienced a free-floating anxiety that I forgot a homework assignment.

As an adult, when I have one of those pensive days of thoughtfulness marked by a hint of sadness or dread, I try to think of Paul McCartney’s wise advice, to just “Let it Be.” After having gone through a few of those days in my seventy years on the planet, I noticed a pattern. Give it a day or two at most, and one’s mood changes, like night and day.

The wisdom in “let it be,” is in the space you give to yourself to feel what you feel, but not too long. In fact, the difference between diagnosed clinical depression and feeling down, is the length of time it lingers. Depressive Disorders stick around past the odd day or two, the normal sad reaction to some trying life circumstance.

I have a rather sober personality, marked by a bit of sarcasm. As they say, I got it honestly. I noticed this in my mom, as I grew into a psychologically perceptive teenager. She wasn’t a laugh out loud (lol) kind of person. Which doesn’t, by the way, mean she had no sense of humor, because she did. She was really, subtly, quite funny at times, eliciting a serious giggle-fest. Belly laughs were just uncommon.

Psychotherapist, Dr. Edith Eger popularized the saying, “expression is the opposite of depression.” This seems simplistic, considering that depression, as in the diagnosis of “major depressive disorder,” is far more complex than the everyday mood swings that most of us experience, and which I’ve been talking about thus far in this article.

However, when my thoughts went back to the 1960s band, the Moody Blues, and broke down their moniker, the whole connection between music and moods, provided some clarity. Blues music is a sub-set of jazz music, which is all about expression, particularly honest expression.

Like some country music (influenced by Blues music), blues lyrics bleat out a bluesy storytelling style, expressing ones feelings about what’s real, the joys, struggles, pain, love-lost, and resilience in a sing-along song from the heart. This is cathartic expression at its best.

Writer, Andrew Solomon said, “the opposite of depression is not happiness, but vitality.” Be honest, don’t you feel more alive, or at least better than before, when you belt out a whiny, complaining country or blues song about losing your dog, your broken-down truck, your ex, or bad boss?

Coming of age in the seventies, when I was aware of such things, I don’t recall hearing about clinical depression. In fact, my first, acute awareness of depression, the real thing, was when I took a job in 1980 at the Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic in Pittsburgh, a university based mental health facility, now a UPMC hospital.

I worked for a Hungarian psychiatrist, doing a study on childhood depression. Although I transcribed session notes with children and their families, I anecdotally learned more about depression from my work-study student.

She complained to my boss that I was difficult to work with. I was told that, my asking her if she minded crossing the street in the blustery rain to pick up our mail, triggered her depression. I was taken aback. What I thought was an act of kindness, was received by a clinically depressed individual as “too much.” She preferred that I tell her what to do rather than ask her, with platitudes. Point taken.

Moodiness was a thing back when I was growing up. And, let’s be frank, it was mostly directed toward the females among us. We were the mood barometers. We knew how to feel. Males were clueless.

I wonder if the gender disparity in depressive disorders, with more women than men diagnosed with depression, is directly connected to the fact that women are traditionally more connected to their emotions than men. We recognize when our emotions are getting out of whack and men are oblivious, generally.

Moodiness can be defined as “frequent, intense emotional fluctuation, shifting quickly between happiness, sadness, irritability, often disproportionate to the situation, caused by factors like stress, hormones, sleep, diet, or underlying issues, and managed through self-care.” The prevalence of mood disorders, particularly depression, in men, has increased from the 1990s to the present, globally.

This jump in mood disorders in men has been labeled a “genuine public health crisis,” presumably because men traditionally do not administer self-care management techniques at the rate of women, for such things as anger, irritability, or substance abuse, which are “male-typical” symptoms of depression.

Wow, that’s gloomy news. So, “what to do,” says Jemima Puddleduck from my Beatrix Potter books?

Here are some tips from the mental health pros: accept imperfection, avoid harsh self-criticism, unashamedly seek therapy, become accountable to someone, avoid ultra-processed foods, move your body, reduce your intake of digital noise including news, social media, & scrolling, say no to unnecessary commitments, get outside, practice deep-breathing, pray, and challenge the “shoulds,” in your life.

You can’t always expect that others will be helpful in getting you through distressing times. Sometimes, like King David in the Bible (I Samuel 30:6), when in the midst of great hardship, we have to encourage ourselves. So, cheerleaders one and all, lets offer three cheers to a less moody 2026!

Most of us didn’t have to learn how to breathe. In with the new, oxygen; out with the old, carbon dioxide. Even our house plants and the trees in our yards and woods do it. It’s one of the most elementary reflexes of life, breathing.

Who knew that breathing could be controversial. How we do it, that is. I can’t say that there is a right way and wrong way to do it, but there is a better way and a worse way to breathe.

My doctor tells me that a massive percentage of people in our area suffer from sinus infections. In fact, eleven to twelve percent of adults in the United States are affected by chronic sinusitis and nine percent of adults have asthma. Snoring, sleep apnea, and emphysema are increasing in the modern age.

I’m learning some new information about how we habitually breathe, which hinders our health and well-being. Part of this information is from a book gifted to me by a dear friend, titled, Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, by James Nestor (2020).

Mouth-breathing is a major culprit in our battle for health and wholeness. Surely you know all about mouth-breathing, the only way to do it when it’s cold and flu season. Or, maybe it’s 24/7, 365 allergy season for you – indoor and outdoor allergies to dust, pollen, cat dander, and any number of other natural or synthetic substances. It’s frustrating to eat, speak, and breathe out of the same orifice.

Use it or lose it is the rule as to nose-breathing, which is the ultimate way to breathe your way to better health, I’m told. I’m no health expert, but I am a keen observer as to what’s what with people.

Back in the early years of the new millennium, I learned from fitness guru, Leslie Sansone, that if you lose your breath during a workout, exhale, don’t inhale. It’s contrary to one’s instinct to blow out a puff of air when you’re feeling breathless; you want to frantically inhale some more oxygen. But, the fact is, once we blow out some carbon dioxide we can bounce back to our rhythmic workout breathing, if we practice. Now, it’s second nature, for me.

I watch a television show called 911: crisis center. One of the most oft used sages of wisdom offered by the 911 first responders is, “take some deep breaths.” And, “just breathe” follows directly behind that advice, for anyone enduring super-stress.

People hyperventilate sometimes when undergoing heaps of stress. We over breathe. We forget to exhale, something I was once told to remember to do, by a prayer partner.

Poor breathing probably stems somewhat from the fight or flight stress response inherent in modern life. We’re triggered to over breathe and breathe too fast by any number of stressors coming at us from our phones, computers, telemarketers, unhelpful customer service representatives, and anything electronic in our lives, not to mention people, usually with good intentions.

It’s not a dismissive comment toward someone who is stressed, to say “just breathe.” Instead it’s a mantra of a mental health movement trying to teach us to slow down our breathing. Breathing slowly and deeply helps with the general well-being of any and all human beings. You don’t have to be a basket case to benefit from slow, deliberate, deep breathing.

There is a 5.5 rule which suggests that we breathe in to a count of 5.5 and breathe out for the same 5.5 beats. This is a nice training tool to help us consciously slow down our breathing; a helpful change of pace from the breathe in, in, in, of hyperventilation or the equally frantic, second-in, second-out repetitive breathing associated with an imminent panic attack, or exertion without conscious breathing.

Another technique that I’m told is used often by military personnel is the 444 rule, box-breathing or square breathing. It’s a simple process to calm your mind and body, improve your focus, and reset your nervous system. Inhale for 4, hold for 4, exhale for 4, and hold for 4, equal counts. Repeat.

I wonder if Edwin Hatch, writer of the 1878 Hymn, Breathe on me, Breath of God (fill me with life anew), had the biblical book of Genesis in mind, recounting God’s having breathed life into the first man, Adam. According to this account, the first human was made from the dust of the ground and God breathed into his nostrils, the “breath of life,” making him a living soul.

It makes one ponder the fact that all of that dust and earth that we’re made of shouldn’t be making us sneeze out of our God-breathed nostrils. Our very substance is linked to the earth which is today filled with allergens that cause us to breathe out of our mouths instead of the noses which I would like to see fulfill their potential for breathing freely.

That’s such a life-affirming phrase, “breath of life.” It is my sincerest hope and heartfelt prayer that commencing in 2026, you will think of every yawn you breathe, every gasp you push from your lungs, every utterance from your mouth, and every unobstructed inhale and exhale from your nose, as a renewed “breath of life.” It would be a glorious 2026 if all of our respiratory illnesses were relaxed and we could shout along with Martin Luther King, “I’m free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty I’m free at last.”

My husband and I have oft said, “well, today I guess we’ll have to make our own fun.” Not every day is fun-filled and I think as the self-employed, we have learned that if it doesn’t come our way, we sometimes have to make it happen.

We all have emotionally dreary days, nothing exciting comes in the mail, and no one seems to be out there, and if they are, they haven’t phoned in any interest in what we’re up to. Atmospherically, there are more dark days over the winter holidays than there is light. Sometimes, me thinks we need to “make our own light.”

“I am the light of the world,” said Jesus. Even better, he told his followers, “you are the light of the world.” So, this time of year especially, we’d better get about the business of making some light.

Everybody loves to see the holiday lights come up on residences, businesses, town streets, and special displays. Lights truly dispel the darkness and give us good cheer. I think it was St. Francis of Assisi who said, “all the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of a single candle.”

The “winter blues” sets in about now. To their extreme, winter blues can become a depressive disorder known as SAD or Seasonal Affective Disorder. Triggered by less sunlight, this seasonal disorder is a real type of depression.

Light therapy can help with SAD symptoms. I know this is serious and this kind of light therapy involves daily therapy with a special light box. However, I wonder on the milder side of the official disorder, if holiday lights might provide the pick-me-up that many more people need, compared to the few with SAD depression.

I’ve read the odd article which has stipulated that some professional designers believe holiday lights indoors, all year long is a faux pas. Who cares. If you care, go ahead and pull down the clear lights which line your fireplace, mantle, and decorate your big plants. But as for me and my household, we’re keeping them up for dark evenings and rainy days, all year long.

Remember the children’s song many of us sang in school or Bible school, “This Little Light of Mine?” Let it shine, folks.

Did you know that there is a literal biological light which emanates from human beings – too faint to see with the eye, but it is extinguished upon death. Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, recorded in Matthew, that we should let our light so shine that we reflect His Spirit within us. What are we routinely reflecting?

My personal belief is that even when we are having a bad day; even if we’re temporarily in a bad mood; even when we feel like we’ll never be happy again, that base core of light within us, still shines. If we follow St. Francis’ wisdom, we must conclude that even when all seems dark, dismal, and hopeless, that glow of biological light, or the measure of spiritual light that dwells within us, will dispel the darkness. Let your light shine.

Have you ever found yourself keeping appointments, running errands, going to work, or doing whatever you need to out in the marketplace, when inside, you’re barely functioning? I’m not talking about moving about without your mandatory cup(s) of coffee. I’m referring to something really hard is going on and you still have to take care of the kids, earn a living, put food on the table or take care of any number of chores that won’t go away.

However, even with that all going on inside your head, you still manage to smile to a stranger waiting in line with you. You still hold the door open for the next person entering the building. Your response to the wait-person or cashier is still courteous, not your usual exuberance, but kind, nonetheless.

How do you think you managed that? I think it’s “this little light of mine.”

I challenge you this season, to take some moments to really absorb the light shining around you. Appreciate that your neighbors, friends, strangers, communities, and organizations have displayed lights, sharing with all of us their light.

Take it all in and let it reflect off of you and bounce back to another human being. Pass on the light, so to speak.

Are you judgmental? Do you pass down judgments like you’re a judicial official in a court of law?

Who am I, to judge others? I’m just one of y’all. You’re just one of us.

I recently read an uplifting article about Brad Paisley, the country music star, and his wife, Kimberly Williams, the actress. They wanted to instill in their children of privilege, the best attitude toward those not born into wealth.

They started a grocery store, then another, in Tennessee, resembling one they toured in California, for folks who need a little help and support with groceries and other stuff found in a supermarket. People get to keep their dignity and shop, selecting their own groceries just like any other market, and the purchase price is mercy.

The article pointed out that eligibility to shop in The Store, requires referral from social or governmental programs, and lasts one year. The Store is intended to lift folks back onto their feet after they’ve fallen on hard times for whatever reason.

When I read this, the first thing I thought was, what a wonderful idea and it warmed my heart. Then, secondly all the judgment thoughts began to raise their ugly heads.

Just who deserves this kind of help? Do I? Does my neighbor? How about this friend and that acquaintance? Do you have to be a certain age, have a certain skin color, or tax bracket?

What defines hard times? Do you have to be an addict, homeless, a senior, or single parent?

What is temporary? A week, a month, a quarter, or a year?

What if you’re working but all of a sudden, it’s just not enough? What if the bottom falls out of the pay check to pay check path and you can’t wait until the next pay check?

Didn’t you save anything for a rainy day? Maybe you had so many rainy days that, mirroring a flash flood, your savings were drained, dry. Maybe the unexpected became the norm and there’s nothing left to spread any thinner.

What if your umbrella turned inside out and your safety net became tangled around your hands and feet? Do you deserve help and support now?

Exactly when does a person deserve compassion? What does it look like to deserve something? Do you have to look sad, poor, dirty, or needy? Is that human dignity, the kind you and I deserve?

We’ve probably all observed somebody or maybe even whole generations of families who have taken advantage of and worked “the system” of U.S. Government benefits for those living through hard times. But, should the few who abuse the umbrella system unfairly, spoil the help for those who humbly need a little help from a friendly face or place? Think about it.

If there is a time of year or season for giving, this is it. It’s Christmas time and we’re generally in a giving mood, if we can, how we can. The Wise Men or Magi came from afar to bring gifts to the Christ Child. The Shepherd Boy brought gifts, as did the Little Drummer Boy. This is not to mention, the whole culture of Santa, elves and reindeer, the entire North Pole and Mrs. Claus, doing their part to give, give, and give some more. We mimic such giving at Christmas.

Who deserves gifts? Do you have to behave yourself to deserve a gift or do you get a lump of coal?

Are you giving “out of the goodness of your heart,” or out of obligation? Do you give because the recipient deserves it, by meeting certain conditions?

If you deserve something supposedly you merit it, earned it, worked for it, or did something to justly receive this reward or punishment. You get what you put in. Thusly, you get the nice gift, or lump of rock in your stocking.

You have a right to expect to receive something you earned; you deserve it. If you worked you should expect to be paid, If you did something measurably wrong, you should expect consequences. This is classic, scientific, cause and effect.

What if you don’t deserve it but get it anyway, the gift or lump? How fair is that?

Well, this is getting into the real meaning of Christmas. If you’re in a gift-giving mood, it’s this real meaning of Christmas in play.

None of us works enough, gives enough, or loves enough, to deserve what we receive at Christmas. We don’t deserve grace and mercy.

Grace is unmerited favor. It’s a free gift that we don’t deserve and didn’t earn, and we maybe even deserve the opposite, but mercy kicked in.

The biblical book of Luke outlines the birth of Christ and also says, “give and you shall receive.” So, maybe we should practice giving with grace this season and just do the first part of the Luke scripture: “give” and let God deal with the fulfillment of the second half of the sentence.

How many ways can we say “thank you,” “I’m thankful,” or “Happy Thanksgiving?” There are over 7100 living languages on earth, so there’s that. Then, there is a plethora of ways to say we’re thankful, grateful, and  how to develop a spirit of gratitude.

I did a little something retro to address the whole concept of gratitude. I consulted a book in print, my “Dictionary of Word Origins,” a much beloved reference book from 1990.

This little bit of research somehow begged for old-school technique rather than a Google search. I enjoy the instant, mostly AI answers from Google as a jumping off point. However, I wanted to see the real deal in this instance.

Speaking of the real deal, I have to share a side-bar comment coming from my two-year-old grandson. He has taken to rejecting his oft sought after favorite snack, a cheese stick, and asking for “real cheese,” instead. His mom and dad have been baffled as to what differentiates “real cheese” in this little one’s mind. Wondering where it came from, his mama asked if we, his grandparents, started the phrase, and trend.

I first denied it. However, I began to wonder if in some passing comment from me to hubby, while I was trapped in play mode and he was free to bring the snack, I said, “just cut up some real cheese,” for example, from a block vs. a cheese stick. And the sharp cookie I was playing with, picked up the “real cheese” moniker, and now won’t have it any other way.

I’ve taken to cutting up all our former cheese sticks on hand, into little cubes. These “real cheese” cubes are received with delight by said, two-year-old.

So, back to the real deal of word origins. Many of our English language words are derived from either Latin or Old French. I personally think it’s cool that we English language speakers can often recognize Latin word origins because of the similarity to English in the word’s structure.

“Thanksgiving” in French is “Action de grace.” As English language speakers with sixty percent of our words coming from Latin and many of the rest derived from Old French, we can suss out that this French phrase translates as an action of grace. And, guess what some cousins of “grace” are? Grateful, gratitude, congratulate, gratuity, gratis, and other similar sounding words related to thankfulness, thanksgiving, or pleasing.

Shall we break this down? When we see that someone has accomplished something for which we are pleased, maybe exceedingly pleased to hear about, we congratulate them.

A gratuity is colloquially known as a tip. We add money to the restaurant, salon, hotel, or taxi bill to show that we are pleased with the service we just received. Originally, we offered a gratuity because we were thankful for exceptional service. In today’s woke world, when gratuities are added without our consent in some establishments, or forced upon us as a “guilt-offering” so as not to be deemed a Grinch, I don’t know.

Some of us “older” folks still remember giving a tip or gratuity because we’re thankful for good service. We’ve presumably had our share of poor service, bad service, or barely any “service” at all and learned to adjust our gratuity accordingly. We don’t really understand being told how much to tip folks in the “service” industry.

My husband and I have been in business for over thirty years and we have become accustomed to including a product in many retail mail-orders, for free. This free product has been known as a “gratis,” as my husband spoke a little Belgian French in his formative years living in the Belgian Congo and impressing the Belgian girls necessitating his speaking their language.

Latin gratus, and French gratis, in this personal example, is a gesture of thankfulness for the order, thus we give a little something back. That’s how we do business. The idea is that generosity should not be transactional but that generosity might be reaped, having given out of a truly generous spirit.

Here’s some musical trivia for you, a “grace note” in a musical composition is added for its flair and beauty, it’s not essential to the composition, it’s there just for the pleasure of it. The words, grace and gratifying are two of the “gratitude” cousins.

Grace is something extra. It’s a thing of beauty and not a given that we all have grace. It’s an elegant, pleasing, embellishment or ornament. Just like a necklace or scarf adds elegance to an outfit, there’s a certain kind of flair to people of grace.

If you’re a gracious person, you stand out as pleasantly kind, courteous, and others are put at ease when around you. You may also be held in some esteem for the benevolence you offer to others, derived from the thankfulness you feel for the favor you’ve received.

Derived from “gratia,” grace and gratification mean, pleasure, favor, and thanks. We’ve often heard it said that certain people have grace to cope with certain situations in which they find themselves. They have a sort of supernatural favor to live through a situation for which most of us could not equally cope.

If we feel pleasure having received an honor or compliment, endured through a difficult task, or completed some such thing that we doubted we could, that’s gratification. We’re usually compelled to say thank you for grace, received.

Let me conclude with this personal anecdote. Probably a dozen years ago, a passerby stopped and asked if I had a home, thinking I was a homeless bag-woman, while I was picking up litter along a secondary road which I frequently walked. Not knowing that my ultimate dream as an adult has been to be thought of as elegant. He surely thought of me as many things, charming not being one of them.

Dear God, give me grace. Thank you in advance. I pray that you all have a very “Joyeux le jour de l’action de grace(s).” Happy Thanksgiving.