True Thanksgiving
You use gratitude like cocaine, she said. Confusion followed the stun of my kind friend’s smack of truth, and shame infused my face as I tried to process her words. When asked how I was doing, I’d developed a habit of reciting my blessings. With my husband on a path to a predicted death, gratitude became my instant inoculation against feelings. I could escape the pain of seeing dreams of growing old together vanishing and the impending morphine pump making its appearance. Looking at the truth hurt. Counting my blessings helped. In the years since, everything from life’s ordinary inevitable
