Why I Am Grateful A Diary Entry from 6252018

Today I'm grateful for another sunrise and the chance to live and breath and face the challenges God has placed before me. I'm grateful that despite a few aches and pains, I still have the ability to walk, talk and use all my limbs for nearly anything I desire to do physically, within reason. I'm reminded of people like Charles Krauthammer, the Fox News commentator who passed away a few days ago to cancer and spent most of his adult years paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair. Despite his disability, Charles graduated from Harvard Medical School and later changed careers to become a writer and political commentator, eventually winning the Pulitzer Prize for exceptional journalism and becoming a strong yet open and fair-minded voice for conservative political views. He is also well known as the author of the New York Times best selling book: "Things that Matter." Politics aside, Krauthammer was one of the most intelligent and highly respected political pundits of our time. If you never watched him on Fox News you missed some remarkably deep-thinking social/political thoughts and ideas coming from a man who dearly loved this country and was always striving to bridge the gaps that so deeply divide our political parties these days. While this may not sit well with many of my more liberal, left-leaning friends and family members, I make no apology for "tipping my hat" and paying due respects to a man who, on more than one occasion, lifted both my spirits and political insights. Despite his disability, through sheer determination, perseverance and intellect he became a stellar example of the undaunted human spirit and what man is capable of accomplishing despite extremely unfortunate circumstances. I'm so very grateful to have known (of) him thanks to the power of television and Fox News.

I'm also grateful for the opportunity to have proudly served my country for 20 years in the United States Navy alongside some of the finest men and women on this planet. More importantly, I'm grateful for all those who, throughout American history, ever served in the armed forces, especially those who fought and/or died for the freedoms we enjoy today. This includes all those patriot-heroes from Lexington and Valley Forge to Gettysburg; from Belleau Wood to St. Mihiel (WW I); from Pearl Harbor to Normandy, Anzio and the Battle of the Bulge to Midway, Leyte Gulf, Luzon, The Bataan Death March, Iwo Jima and Okinawa (WW II). And let us not forget those who gave their sweat, toil and blood in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and continue to carry the fight for freedom throughout the world today in Afghanistan and elsewhere. The cost of freedom is incalculable in terms of human sacrifice and suffering and I am more grateful than words could ever express for being born with the freedoms granted by God under the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution and those who fought and died to create and keep those freedoms alive for ours and generations yet unborn.

And because of the freedoms we enjoy in large measure thanks to those who lived and died to attain and protect them, I am eternally grateful for my family, especially my departed, and once deeply loving parents, Robert and Rose Martin; my wonderful wife and best friend, Minnie; daughters Wanda and Rachael along with Rachael's husband Keith and their beautiful daughter (our granddaughter), Gabriella; my brothers and sisters, nieces, nephews, grandparents, great grandparents and countless other family members and ancestors who lived, struggled and died long before I was born, yet unknowingly, made my life possible.

I'm grateful for all the friends and kindhearted people I've known throughout my life and places that I've had the good fortune to visit around the globe including Japan, Australia, Spain, Italy, Greece and Egypt to name but a few. I count myself more than a little bit lucky to have tasted their foods and learned of their cultures, languages and unique customs, traditions and beliefs. My life is by far richer, more meaningful and forever changed for the better because of these friendly, foreign encounters. I'm grateful also for music, (especially country and bluegrass) as well as art, photography and the memory of my father teaching me the basics of this unique form of capturing special moments in time and visual expression when I was young.

We're living in troublesome, worrisome times and its good to step back now and then to reflect upon all that's good, honorable and beautiful within ourselves and one another. The ancient Greek's had a word I've always admired, Arate', meaning excellence of any kind including moral virtue as well as the fulfillment of one's full potential. While I personally have millions of miles to go before even remotely approaching close proximity to my "full potential," I'm grateful just knowing the possibility is there to reach ever higher and keep striving towards whatever goals I may have aspirations to achieve. I'm grateful to God Almighty for endowing me with the mere possibility or idea of reaching my "full potential," yet another one of the many undeserved gifts He has provided including the gift of life itself.

And last but certainly not least, I'm grateful to everyone who has ever crossed the path of my life's journey in whatever large or small measure of time or matter we may have once had the good fortune to share together. I wish that I could rewind the clock and relive many of those moments with you again but without question, that's an impossible dream as time marches on. So be it. I'm grateful for tha

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