It Came Upon a Midnight Drear(y)

Photo by djLicious

It was a bleak, Black Friday ...

Have you ever stopped to consider the irony that we celebrate Thanksgiving--a day in which we spend the day extolling things we are thankful for--only to follow it up with a day in which we try to stuff as much into our shopping carts as humanly possible?

"I am thankful for my family." (But it would be great to have that laptop, too.)

Well, maybe you didn't shop on Friday, but I did.

My brother, sister-in-law, and I decided to brave Black Friday in style. After driving around the parking lot of one particular store for over a half-hour, we parked about a mile away and played frogger across multiple lanes of midnight traffic.

Here is what I was thankful for on Thanksgiving night: I survived.

While standing in a check-out line that (quite literally) wrapped around the store, we watched as a shopper stepped away from her cart to check on something with the cashier who was tallying her total. After the two of them disappeared, vultures lighted on the shopper's cart (many of her items already in bags) and when the carnivores were done, the only things left on the cart were its wheels.

Here's the thing. I came away with gifts for my family that I am thankful to have saved same some pennies on. But I am more aware than I ever have been that while I am thankful for many things ... there is the still, small voice that tells me I would be MORE thankful with LESS.

It was a bleak, Black Friday. But my outlook is getting brighter.

Hope your holiday was one for the books--