The richest nation in human history has a cancer eating at its soul.  

Daily the newspapers, televisions, magazines and blogs vilify evil oil companies for their greed and avarice.  As for me, I am thankful for oil companies who supply the fuel that powers my automobile, heats my home, and provides the electicity for my lights.   I am thankful for the small percentage of profit they eke out of their vast business ventures to reward those owners and stockholders who invested in the enterprise in the first place.  

I am thankful for the vilified rich people who are the target of the anger and vitriolic verbal attacks in our media and political campaigns.  For without rich people I never would have found my first job.   Without rich people I never would have found customers to afford the homes I built.   I am thankful for all of those greedy rich people who bought land, built companies, purchased machinery, paid workers and efficiently operated businesses that produced my automobiles, food, clothing and home.   I am thankful they chose to apply their time, talent, effort and resources to producing the goods I enjoy.

I am thankful for the hard working people who labor daily to provide the goods and services that I enjoy.  Without those who sew my clothes, produce my food, transport their goods to local stores for me to purchase, serve me in restaurants and maintain the roads,  I would have to provide everything necessary for my own survival.

I am thankful for the pain in my life that taught me to stop being stupid and arrogant.  Hard times and pain have changed my arrogance to humility, my stupidity to wisdom, my laziness to industry, my bad habits to service for others, my greed to generosity, my harshness to kindness and my wastefulness to thrift.

I am thankful for the beautiful things in life that allow me to sit back and enjoy the handiwork of man and the Creator alike.  Beautiful golf courses, brilliant sunsets, bountiful apple orchards, rushing streams, fields of wheat, snowcapped peaks, incredible structures, pounding surf, engineered bridges, herds of elk, a well-tuned race car, or a newborn baby all whisper the beauty that is everywhere on the earth.

I am thankful for the knowledge, understanding, and wisdom that is ours to discover.   Anyone can find wisdom who is willing to open their heart and mind sufficiently to ask, seek, research, listen, consider, think, experiment and discover Truth.   

I am thankful for a political system that still allows for debate, open discussion, freedom of speech, freedom of association and freedom of thought.   I am thankful for the name calling, heated arguments, disrespectful behavior, distortions, and outrageous promises because the true character of men is revealed in this crucible.

I am thankful for the dead rich guys who founded this country and set up an economic and political system that is taking many decades to dismantle.   This wonderful culture is so resilient and formidable that the “takers” and “deconstructors” of society have found it very difficult to destroy.  So far our political system has endured those who pick at the threads in an attempt to unravel it.

I am thankful for the schools that provide education for kids and adults alike.   Education allows industrious souls to interact deeply, communicate effectively, produce efficiently, serve humbly, manage skillfully, and earn the respect of their fellow man.

In an odd way I am thankful for the terrorists among us who would destroy us all, criminals who prey on the weak, hucksters who trick the masses, con-men who dupe the simple minded, politicians who deceive the weak minded, and charlatans who stir up anger amongst their blind followers.   These predators ensure that wise people remain vigilant and strong, ever prepared against the destruction, trickery and deceit.-

I am thankful for genuine folks who treat me with respect and dignity.  For it is these salt-of-the-earth people who add spice, depth, goodness, honor, kindness, trust, wisdom, character, love, peace, and grace to life.

Tim

Filed under: Real Men Don't Talk Trash by tim