Hi Arlene C. Thank you. I will give my husband an extra hug today. thank you for reminding me what I have. I will never take my husband for granted again!

I take clean air and water for granted. I was just in India for a month. Though it is a country full of wonders I was struck by the pollution, trash and filthy water running through the rivers and harbors.I was not expecting it. Now I understand the emergency our planet faces. And I hear China is worse. I can’t quite believe we expect athletes to sacrifice the health of their bodies to compete in polluted air.

I regret that far too often I take the love of a great man, my husband, for granted.

There is very little I have taken for granted - My own personal safety? Not growing up within the range of A-bombs on NYC. Not when I was an urban college student and had to cope with mugging dangers on the streets. Not when I lived through the Northridge earthquake and used my emergency supplies of water and food…Health care and medicine? Not when I was so terribly broke and ill and had to resort to clinics and freebie meds - not when I had to get hysterical for anyone to listen to me to give me aid from the unions/organizations I belonged to! I suppose there was a very brief time that I thought, as a 7 sister graduate, I would have some sort of eticket - but that soon disintegrated! Men of my generation were notoriously unreliable, so none of that could be taken for granted, either. And I realized that casting is often decorating by the colorblind, so I couldn’t take my talent for granted, either! I camp, so fresh water and sewage systems are not a given, either! I look around and often wonder how this great civilisation manages to run as efficiently as it DOES and ponder on how long it will all last. Will the villas of the California coast become sandy ruins like the Roman villas of North Africa? Will the roads and bridges slowly erode and isolate us as in the Dark Ages? Will the dream of democracy fail and devolve into oligarchy? I am grateful I lived a good deal of my life in the American Century, and hope that its vestiges will last until I have left the planet…Cynical, world-weary, or Cassandra? I wonder…

I took my own needs, hopes, wants, dreams and ambitions for granted everyday until I couldn’t ignore them any longer. I’ve become a statistic. I didn’t plan it that way, it just crept up and demanded I join. Life is easier now, I have choices albeit limited. I’m sometimes frustrated by my limited life, a life that can be hard and lonely, only now I’ve learned not to take myself for granted because life is limited.

“None lives forever, [sister], and nothing lasts for long. Keep this in mind, and rejoice.” Rabindranath Tagore.

Since my dad’s passing, I take no one for granted. I make a point of telling everyone i care about that i care and how important they are to me.

The universe is change. Take nothing for granted, but revel in the bittersweetness of all things passing.

While I endeavor to be grateful every day there are times when you are on automatic pilot in life and so there are things you just expect to happen because they always will. So, I plan gratefulness and I do take the time to send thank you notes and e-mails to people right when I think of them (or I’ll forget). I take for granted my ability to deal with whatever life is cooking up for me…so far, so good. In the last three years, I’ve seen so many transitions among friends, family and colleagues - illnesses, death, births, marriage, loss of job, quitting of jobs, divorce - as well as changes in the world. I pray that I have the resiliency and energy to handle it.

What, or whom, do I take for granted? I used to take so much for granted! That I’d be healthy, that I’d be safe, that I’d be loved, that I could trust my abilities, that I’d be eager. Now, because of circumstances and my health, nothing is guaranteed that comes from outside me, and a lot less that comes from inside. Meanwhile, though, I’ve become increasingly peaceful. It’s okay that I’ll die younger than I thought, and it’s okay to love people who absentmindedly tolerate me. Hmm, maybe what it’s taken me all this time to take for granted is that no matter what, I’ll choose to love.

I, also, took my youth for granted and despite knowing better, I imagined that Daddy would always be with me. Now I’m trying very hard not to take Mother for granted and to wrap up in the essence of the beauty and knowledge she’s acquired from 80 years of living. May I say that is truly an honour to be in the presence of so many wise and introspective women. Thank you!

Vivvy and to all new to the site: Welcome to the circle. Iris