what are you thankful for?

Article by missy on November 21st, 2007 at 9:53 am

This year, I’m most grateful for the successful treatment of my father-in-law’s prostate cancer, which caught us all by surprise back in February when an x-ray to diagnose L.’s hip pain revealed what his annual PSA tests had not. (Some of the rarer and more aggressive forms of prostate cancer do not raise the PSA above the normal range until they have metastasized.)

I am also thankful for my in-laws move to Vancouver from southern Oregon; for all of our instructors and fellow students at King Tiger Martial Arts; for great coworkers (who almost make up for my recently insane boss); for lower interest rates that allowed us – finally – to roll our odious student loans into our mortgage; for beautiful if below-freezing weather for Thanksgiving day; for having a talented, creative and generous mother-in-law to split the holiday cooking with me; and, for being born at a time and in a place (and with very little melanin) such that securing the necessities of life has never been a struggle.

By this time next year, I hope to be thankful for a President Elect John Edwards, a filibuster-proof Democratic majority in the Senate, the drawdown of troops in Iraq, the failure of Cheney to get his invasion of Iran, a new job for me, a job for my husband in one of the school districts closer to home, and less self-induced stress for L. (who is a perfectionist in all things, from his homework to his butterfly kicks).

We’re shutting the office down early today, and after that I’ll be home making pumpkin cheesecake, brioche and jalapeno-tequila cranberry sauce, so this is farewell until at least Friday. Have a fabulous Thanksgiving, y’all, and revel in your good fortune (whatever it is).

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4 comments to what are you thankful for?

• Chief Wahoo clarkblog.org

  November 22, 2007 at 5:30 am · Reply to this comment

  This year’s secular Thanksgiving prayer was written by the People’s Economist Professor Kurgman, PhD,PhD,PhD. I will share it with you before we offer it at our table…

  As much as I abhor Christianity, I occasionally attend progressive churches in my community – as long as the pastor expounds on socialism and its variants like environmental causes, and the rights of the oppressed masses of gays, wymyn, African-Americans, Palestinians, Hugo Chavez, and Hezbollah. Our local pastor, thank Lenin, rarely talks about anything else. He even asked me, a Marxist, to compose a prayer for this week’s Thanksgiving sermon.

  Now, everybody knows that Thanksgiving observance does nothing more than perpetuate the Holocaust of the Native American. What positive meaning could be found in such a grotesquely shameful holiday? Well, my admirable laser-sharp mind of an economist with three PhDs immediately found a brilliant, socially significant answer.
  
  Blessing of the Government Taxes

  Let us pray.

  Let me, Dear God, shift the paradigm on this Thanksgiving and blissfully give thanks for the gift of government, and thank the government for the gift of taxes. Bless my taxes, O God! Give me peace of mind as I rejoice in filling out forms and returning money to its rightful owner, the government. Keep me joyous, I pray, as I write out those checks. Yea, Lord, we know that there is little reason to be joyous with this Administration’s imperialism and impending rape of the Iranian peaceful energy program, but the thought of a new tax year still brings to us a swelling tear of joy. And whisper to me, Lord, all the good reasons that I send my money to my government every year.

  Raise my awareness to the fact that I could not write this prayer, and would be a barely-functioning illiterate living in the gutter, if I had not received a free tax-subsidized education; my parents could not have afforded both my tuition and their own tax payments, so my tuition was supplied, at no expense to anyone, by the government. Remind me of how my mind has been so wondrously calibrated by our free public schools!

  Gently show me that the Internet, through which I send this prayer to others, was created by committees of civil servants. Help me to recall that my freedom to pray as I wish was purchased with tax dollars that paid for dairy price supports. Quietly kiss me as you raise my awareness that the only deserving people, the most noble among us, are those who subsist on government programs — paid for with our taxes. My Lord my God, fondle me as you energize me with the hopefulness of higher taxes that can pay for an even more effective Internal Revenue service, which in turn can collect even more taxes for an even more effective Internal Revenue Service, which will culminate in an ecstatic spiral of an all-encompassing tax-collecting mechanism that will be accountable to no one except to the spirit of economic justice.

  Reveal to me, Lord, in my mind’s eye, the public health workers, the regulators of the environment and of commerce, the employees of the Department of Energy, and the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Department of Education, and the Administration for Children and Families, and the Minerals Management Service, and the Rural Business-Cooperative Service, and the Minority Business Development Agency , and the Japan-United States Friendship Commission , and the Government National Mortgage Association, and the Housing and Urban Development Department, and the Committee for the Implementation of Textile Agreements, and the Institute of Peace, and the Bureau of International Labor Affairs, and the Tennessee Valley Authority, and the Small Business Administration, and the Superfund Basic Research Program , and the President’s Commission on Moon, Mars and Beyond, and the Office of Refugee Resettlement, and the Office of Thrift Supervision, and the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission , and the Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee , and the Susquehanna River Basin Commission, and the Stennis Center for Public Service, and the Saint Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation , and the Peace Corps, and the Office of Public and Indian Housing, and the President’s Council on Integrity and Efficiency, and the National Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare, and the National Interagency Fire Center, and the Northwest Power Planning Council, and the Multifamily Housing Office , and the Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer, and especially the Internal Revenue Service, and all the other things that my taxes and your taxes make possible.

  And please, Lord, remind my brothers and sisters that they should liquidate their savings accounts and mutual funds, bonds and CDs, so that they too can be forced to turn it over to the greatest bargain of all that is Social Security. Educate me, Dear One, of how difficult life was for the sick and elderly before they paid throughout their entire careers, with threat of imprisonment, 14% of their wages for the iron-clad guarantees of Social Security. Please, Lord, make everyone realize that there is no investment more secure, and none that gives such a generous return, as Social Security.

  Take me out of my selfishness and give me a spirit of gratitude as I write those tax checks! Remind me of my own virtue as I inform the IRS of cheaters. Inspire me to see that my sacred duty is to serve those who are unable to provide “value” to others, or are unwilling to provide anything for themselves. And that my highest calling is to ensure that others return whatever they have to the Government that You have created.

  O Dear One, there are so many ways I wish my taxes could be spent! I’m willing, O Lord, to pay even more in taxes if it would work for the common good: We need a strong government to take back from the rich few and generously give to the many! Lord my God, please put the brakes on commerce, remove all profits from the pigs who “produced” it, and turn it all over to those who deserve it. So, more than ever, dear God, give me the strength and the vision to rise up and press my government to unapologetically take back what is ours. My sacred duty as a spokesperson for the working class can only be fulfilled if we organize, advocate, protest, resist, agitate, and speak truth to power by writing tax checks. I ask for your guidance, God, as I join with others to change the priorities and values of our government, so that they reflect more of our collective will, and my struggle, as expressed through your will.

  Lord, you have created all men and wymyn as equals. Any disparity from your plan is an affront to decency. And so I pray, my Dear Lord, that you fulfill your vision for true equality, and remove all excess. In service to you, my Lord, we will not rest until everyone is truly equal. Tax the rich. Sicken the healthy. Scar the beautiful. Destroy the “successful”. Drown the bankers. Blind the stock traders. Cripple the athletes and sever the hands of the musicians. Plant carnivorous bacteria in the brains of those who score high on racist “IQ” tests. Deliver wasting diseases to the strong. Starve and stone the executives and managers. Show no mercy to the blood-sucking merchants as they suffer merciless deaths in the searing flames of gargantuan infernos. Smash capitalism and deliver us, Dear One, to our deserved socialist paradise.

  May your blessing rest on my Form 1040, dear Lord, and may my taxes well serve you and my fellow citizens!

  Amen.

• bushtool democracyforvancouver.org

  November 22, 2007 at 6:16 am · Reply to this comment

  This prayer is rather delusional don’t you think?

  What about having love, respect and compassion for one another?

  This is not a Thanksgiving prayer, it is a disgrace.

• slim nofishnonuts.blogspot.com

  November 22, 2007 at 9:42 pm · Reply to this comment

  Chief, I don’t think I deserved that in reply to my good-natured post. The picture may have set you off – I don’t know. I was trying to lighten things up before talking about my father-in-law’s cancer.

  You may have meant it to be funny, but it was one of the most mean-spirited and passive-aggressive things I’ve read in a long time. At least when I’m attacking Bush I do it openly.

  Peace, Chief.

• arturo

  November 24, 2007 at 11:46 am · Reply to this comment

  Sigh. Mean spirited to say the least. I think Chief’s purpose here is to crap in the sandbox, so to speak. To render foul the small piece of turf progressives have carved out in Vancouver. I know there are problems with managing blogs, but there are also problems with letting little boys pee on whatever they feel like without correcting their behavior.

  I am thankful I do not see my right to free speech as also giving me the right to be cruel and destructive.
  I am thankful I have a moral compass.