2011: I’ve started a new chapter in my life. It’s one that sort of started through facebook. Until a year or so ago, my writing expertise was limited to thank you notes. I could write a thank you note like nobody’s business, and I knew it. People told me so. And I thanked them. And I’d write every note with all of the proper greetings, grammar, salutations and punctuation just as my big book of manners taught me. Cook me dinner? THANK YOU! Assist me on some volunteer committee? Thank you AGAIN! Send me a gift, and I’d make you feel like Oprah.

Facebook gave me the opportunity to quit ONLY saying thank you to others and start BEING thankful for the gifts that I’ve been given through my writing and wacky sense of humor. My gifts just aren’t wrapped this time with PROPER punctuation and grammar. I recognize those gifts and appreciate them now. I even want to share them. Once you accept a gift, you can politely say thank you and let it go to waste, or you can use it. I can see the FABULOUS in the normal things now, and it’s like finding gift after gift after gift under all of the tissue and shiny paper and “perfectly” tied ribbons.