Month: November 2018

People of a Certain Age, when you were a kid, did your Mom make you sit down and write a thank you note for every gift and check you received for Christmas or your birthday? My mother did.

I’m glad she did because she was instilling a good habit in me, to say thank you.

The trouble I always had was with the next couple of sentences my five-year-old self felt compelled to write beyond.  “Thank you for the check for five dollars.” I felt like I should add another thought or two in my child’s printing style to provide any benefactor with more than just one sentence.

This explains why so many of the letters I wrote at that age included something like “How are you? I am fine.” And then a printed closing “Your friend Danny.”

At that time in my life, I was not prone to commenting about the weather or chirping “how ‘bout them Yankees?” So the letters were short. They were required work, however, and always needed to include the words “thank you.” “Thanks” was too informal.

The advent of Thanksgiving this year got me thinking about thanking. Americans have shared a common understanding about “the first Thanksgiving,” when the settlers from England and Native Americans shared a feast, the settlers thanking God they were still alive and had food. (Not much has been written about why the Native Americans showed up, but they were probably invited, and showing up when invited is good manners.)

Abraham Lincoln is credited with officially designating one day for Thanksgiving in all states in 1863, choosing the fourth Thursday in November. Note that this was two months after issuing the Emancipation Proclamation.

Other countries have set aside official Thanksgiving holidays, too, often toward the end of harvest season.  The fact that, today, the vast majority of celebrants do not harvest any of the food they eat at Thanksgiving is beside the point.  There is a day when people are encouraged to give thanks, by national proclamation, and that’s just fine.

That’s Thanksgiving, the holiday. What about a life of thanksgiving?

There is a tire dealer in Hawaii who ends every commercial, or radio or television with “thank you very much.” There is something about the earnestness with which the words are clearly enunciated and carefully spoken to make one believe that the fellow (now deceased) really means to thank you for your business.

“Antiques Roadshow” on PBS is preceded and followed by short statements from sponsors that include one citing those of us who contribute money to PBS.  At the close of that citation, a woman’s voice sparkles the words “thank you,” making it almost sound like she is pleasantly surprised. It’s hard not to answer her “you’re welcome!”

My guess is that all of us in our About Aging network say thanks whenever someone hands us something or offers a compliment. “Thanks” is as automatic as “how’re you doing?” or “fine, thanks.”  It illustrates what Dad loved to call an attitude of gratitude.

Dad loved rhymes. He certainly did not invent that one. He probably preached a sermon or two by that title. He could not have known that Psychology Today would publish articles about the benefits of an attitude of gratitude on one’s mental health, because he died several years before the articles were published.

I thought about Dad’s attitude of gratitude when thinking about thanking. I thought about the almost electric spark that one can feel thanking someone else or being thanked. I felt that the other day when a worker at my house, as he was leaving, thanked us for being “so accommodating to his work.” I didn’t think I had done anything remarkable but he did and he said so, making the next few moments of my life sparkle.

The holiday is a special time to count your blessings, especially the big ones: family, friends, good health, comfortable living, freedom, grace, and so on.  It wouldn’t hurt to be grateful every day for these big things, beyond the fourth Thursday in November while eating a big meal.

People of a Certain Age, any of us could make a long list of little things for which we are grateful: the people who keep the electricity coming to our homes; the person who delivers our paper each morning; the engineers who work out traffic, construction, and mechanical stuff; teachers, etc. I’m grateful for the fact that major league baseball will start up again in little more than three months and that skilled people in the Marlborough region of New Zealand make good wine from Savignon grapes.

It is folly to believe that one can feel grateful for bad stuff in life but, hey, sometimes it takes a bout of bad stuff to remind us to be grateful for the good. In Hawaii, “Kimo’s Rules” include: “No rain, no rainbows.”

My Mom got me started in the attitude of gratitude in a formal way, awkward and childish though the messages might have been. My Dad reminded me to be grateful for more than presents. When I remember to live a life of thanksgiving, I honor them, too.

Daniel E. White

November 22, 2018

In November 1968, candidate Richard Nixon began to wrap up a speech by saying “And so tonight—to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans—I ask for your support.” Nixon used the term to describe citizens who did not take part in demonstrations and were not, in his way of thinking, counter-culture.

People of a Certain Age remember the phrase—silent majority. I did not take part in demonstrations, nor did I think of myself as counter-culture, so, according to Nixon’s definition, I would have been a part of the group. But, in terms of my attitudes and beliefs, I was not.

Still, Nixon’s taxonomy, dividing the voluble from the silent, accurately, if very generally, described the American polity. One couldn’t really tell what most of the people were thinking because they were not talking in noticeable ways. That division rings true today.

New York Times columnist David Brooks has written about More in Common, “a new international initiative set up in 2017 to build communities and societies that are stronger, more united, and more resilient to the increasing threats of polarization and social division,” first registered in the United Kingdom. Researchers for More in Common have written a typology of the American electorate, defining seven groups across the political spectrum.

Brooks wrote, “It won’t surprise you to learn that the most active groups are on the extremes—Progressive Activists on the left (8% of Americans) and Devoted Conservatives on the right (6%).” In his column, Brooks shares his two “big takeaways” from the study, the second of which is “ideas really do drive history.” He asserts that both Progressive Activities and Devoted Conservatives “organize around coherent philosophical narratives” which, he says, are both visions of a just society and “about who needs to be exorcised from society.”

Much of the rest of Brooks’ column describes differences and intensities of beliefs, much of which is predictable. What caught my eye was this: “roughly 2/3 of Americans, across four political types, fall into what the researchers call “the exhausted majority.” 61% say people they agree with the need to listen and compromise more.” (My emphasis.)

President Nixon, in 1968, asserted that there were two groups, the assertive and the silent.  It is not much of a stretch to suggest that the same two groups still exist, though named a bit differently.  A significant difference between then and now is that both groups are subjected to “noise” 24/7 in which the committed reinforce their biases and the rest just want some peace and quiet. These are the exhausted majority.

Brooks notes that, unlike the Progressive Activists and the Devoted Conservatives, the “people in the exhausted majority have no narrative.” He concludes by saying, “I don’t know what the next political paradigm will look like, but I bet it will be based on abundance not deficits; gifts, not fear; hope, not hatred.”

Now, here is a challenge worth the effort to meet: to construct a “coherent political narrative” for the exhausted majority!

To start the process, we might propose a few ground rules:

1. Ignore all negative political advertising. Millions of dollars are spent dishing dirt on the assumption that you and I, as voters, are influenced by these messages. Let’s foil the dirt dishers by resolving to explore what candidates say they stand for, specifically, not in generalities like “I support lower taxes.”
2. Start watching TV news at the start of the second half of the show. “If it bleeds, it leads” is the industry standard for news most times. Where are the reports about progress, service, successful endeavors? In the second half, if at all, often after the weather.
3. Engage where you can make a difference. Let the D.C. types snipe at each other and let us attend to the local opportunities to make the places and communities where we live better. James and Deborah Fallows have written Our Towns about the small cities and communities that have confronted change in a positive way, citizens working together without regard to political labels. It is a worthwhile read. Haven’t most of the creative developments in the history of humans living in harmony with each other started small, locally, in neighborhoods and communities?
4. Perhaps construct a matrix detailing areas of agreement across political boundaries. List a variety of questions like “do you believe that all citizens should have equal access to the opportunities of the community?” and “do you believe in freedom of speech?” that people would answer and then talk with each other about their responses. My bet is that there will be more than 90% agreement among the discussants about what we believe and the values we share.
5. Decide to be agreeable even when we disagree. Overwhelm any negative types with kindness and respect.

And, we might also recall that the message projected by the last President to be elected by winning over 58% of the popular vote was “Morning in America,” and the President who won more votes than any other person in American history assured us “Yes, we can.”

Wouldn’t you like to help construct a coherent political narrative for the exhausted majority built around mornings and possibilities?

Daniel E. White

November 11, 2018