Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Where I Stand:

Count your blessings, and give thanks for them

This is a Thanksgiving column that can write itself.

People across this country will gather on Thanksgiving Day — or whichever day their schedules allow — with family and friends for what has consistently been that time of year when the blessings of living in America are brought home.

At least they are brought to our doorsteps, whether they are actually invited in remains the challenge as we try to perfect this not yet perfect union of ours.

As we approach Thanksgiving, we should take a moment to consider all we have for which we should be thankful.

I am thankful for my friends. The past seven years have been challenging — in all respects — as we have each tried to understand what compelled some “friends” to do about-faces on their morality and ethics. But, like most people, I am thankful for those I still have.

I am very thankful that the angst Americans have been living with for far too long — that constant concern that the democracy we have known was eroding before our eyes with no sign of stopping — has waned just a bit with the just concluded midterm elections.

Americans turned out at election time and said “NO” to the election deniers, anarchists, all kinds of haters and people who had no business on our ballots — at least most of them. I am thankful, as should we all be, that there is a new hope and a belief that American democracy, as fragile as it is, will hold.

This past week Michael Pascal was laid to rest. I am thankful we were there to say goodbye because we witnessed an extended family and a host of friends who each defined him as the consummate family man — a man dedicated to his family and his legion of friends. I would think that we would all be thankful to be described that way at the end of our lives?

I am also thankful that Nevadans turned out to turn away the forces of doom and gloom at the polls — well, most of it — to show the rest of the country that Nevada can and does lead the way toward sanity.

And, while heartbroken to learn everyday of the abject cruelty that some parents can visit upon their children — killing them while they sleep or blowing them up while toddlers play in their homes — I am thankful that the rest of us can still recoil at such madness.

And, it goes without saying, that the inhumanity of some who continue to condone the brutality against our school kids and other innocents at the end of an automatic weapon must come to an end. That would cause us all to be thankful.

Much closer to home, what could have been a horrific tragedy this week was avoided. There will be some pain, and there will be healing. And, for that, I am a most thankful father.

Yes, Thanksgiving is a time to give thanks. To appreciate what we have — even if we don’t think we have all that much.

We have each other. That is more than we need.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Brian Greenspun is editor, publisher and owner of the Sun