Give thanks...

I woke this morning a bit disconnected.Not truly lost nor alone, simply feeling out of my time. I watched a bit of the news this morning. Fatal crashes from our icy road conditions, a sick baby girl, whose family is asking for help were the two main topics of the morning. But there was one more that disturbed me and brought back to me thoughts and emotions I had been carrying with me for a week or more. The media was talking about the recession and people were on the Tele talking about how they wondered what they would do for money concerning their kids' presents for birthdays and how much they wished they had NOT spent at Christmas. I sat up and listened closely to one lady say she was going to have to sell off her "200" pairs of shoes she had. A man was talking about his assets and how he would survive the recession by liquidating some of his assets. He felt it important that his children were not deprived of the life style they are used to living.
I suppose another time this would have slipped right by me but today... it did not. Thinking of why their attitudes impacted me so, memories of a book I have been reading came rushing back at me. I do not read so often as when i am writing novels I do not like anothers writing to influence my thoughts. I was in between projects and so I read a book I had read many years ago. The story is about a young German girl and her family that during the Nazi attack on the Jews, took refuge in an Annexe of a warehouse.They lived there for better than two years and this young girl kept a Diary of her daily life, hidden inside the walls of this warehouse. She was a writer at heart and would have become world known for her novels I am certain. She did become renowned through out the entire world but only for her Diary. She didn't even live long enough to see her writing become as famous as her name. I am of course writing about Anne Frank.
Anne Frank... A young girl that came from a well to do family. A young girl whose life was turned inside out but wrote of the good things she learned and how easily she had taken so many things for granted. The sounds of a bird chirping, the smell of fresh air and the feel of rain on her face. Simple things that happen daily and go un-noticed at least half of the time that we ourselves experience them. She lived without food sometimes for days. She lived or I should say survived daily in unsafe, unsanitary, to be honest, unlivable conditions and yet still wrote to "Kitty" her diary, every day. Birthdays came as did Christmas and her gifts were that of sugar and potato's and sprays from a bottle of her mothers perfume. Her nights were plagued with bombs exploding all around and her days with hunger pains and fright that they might be discovered.
They were discovered, more betrayed by someone they knew for 1.24 in American money. The family was taken to Austwitch where Anne saw her friends led into the gas chambers. Anne Frank died in March of 1945 from Typhus. Two months later, the camps were liberated. She never knew that one day, her name would become a household name and that the world would come to know her as if she were their sister.
I sit and think about the people I saw on T.V. The man worried that his family might not have All they were so used to. The woman concerned with birthday gifts for her kids. I hear people complain about how "tough" things are right now and how much they have to cut back on just to survive. I listen and I close my eyes. I pray a prayer of thanks to God for all that I have. I thank him for the food I eat daily. I thank him for the books I read, the things I buy and even the computer I use right now to write this for you. And I think, Rough??? You have not even touched the tip of the Iceberg. The country may in fact be in some "tough" times but if you have a roof over your head and food to feed and fill your tummy, then count those blessings. If you are reading this blog without censorship, if you are eating what you like and going to the church of your choice, then you have not seen "Rough" yet.
The next time you think things are so bad here, stop for a minute and think of Anne and her family. Think about all she DID NOT Have and yet she endured and lived her life as best as she could in that tiny Annexe that was her home for more than two years. She never stopped believing and never stopped writing. And Stop... and thank God for the beauty of freedom that we have. DO not take for granted all that God has given to us. Always, Darrel