Where we give thanks. Today.
I have a huge list of things to be thankful for, but there are a couple that surprised even me:
Racist jokes.
When I was younger, I used to think racist jokes were the worst things imaginable. Even worse than 'shut up' or 'stupid'. They irked me, until the 4th grade. In the 4th grade, I met a boy who made racist jokes, things like, "What did you eat for dinner? OH WAIT, you're Asian. Of course, rice and eggrolls." At that time, I thought those were horrible, and I'd come home feeling rotten. But now that I think about it, these racist jokes helped me become a lot more insensitive to words that people use to try and hurt me. And now, this boy is one of my best friends. So I have two things to be thankful for in this category, racist jokes, and one of my best friends.
Faulty Calculators.
I had one of those days. The ones where I want to stay at home and sleep. I woke up at 6:50, and had to get to school by 7:10. I thought it was an A day, when in fact it was a B day. (On A days, I had gym, on B days, I had math.) I forgot about the math test we had, and my Physics teacher gave us a pop quiz. So, while I was taking my math test, I was calculating an integral on my TI-89, when I realized the calculator was giving me the wrong answers. So I had to work out all of my problems by hand. At the time, of course, I felt like running away and never doing math again, but then I realized that I was becoming too dependent on my calculator, and that not using it was a good measure of my knowledge. I'm pretty thankful for that. (By the way, the TI-89 is a HUGE reason why college and high school students are failing math.)
Bellyflops.
Bellyflops hurt. I found that out during my diving practice. I tried to do a forward dive pike for the first time, and I couldn't get out of it fast enough. BAM. It hurt. A lot. But that's okay, because then I felt like getting it right, and got back on the board. I didn't end up doing a forward dive pike, but I did end up doing an inward for the first time. I'm thankful for bellyflops too.
This time of year makes me think of being thankful, when I should really be thankful all year. Unless you're a turkey.
Happy Thanksgiving.
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