An Attitude of Thankfulness

I sighed peacefully.  I loved Sunday afternoons.  An early morning of church was over and I was ready to catch up on that sleep I missed when I had to wake up at 6:00 that morning. 

            The rain poured down viciously on the roof above my head.  I heard thunder clash and a bolt of light shine in from outside my closed shutters.  I especially loved naps in the soothing sound of rain.  It just made me want to curl up underneath my blankets even more.

            Unfortunately, the rain didn’t do the same thing for my brothers.  Every Sunday afternoon, they were banned to their room to be quiet for at least two hours.  But that didn’t always go so well.

            Today’s nap looked promising.  Thank you God for the quiet.  But, the second I closed my eyes, a loud shriek was heard from the room at the end of the hallway. 

            “Denver, give it back!”

            “But it was mine first! Why do you always want my stuff?” I groaned and shoved a pillow over my head.  Where were my parents to intervene?

            The door directly next to me creaked open.  Oh great. Now they’ll all get into this mess and all be fighting.  I heard the deep voice of my sixteen-year old brother, Dayton, as he and Orlando stepped into the twins’ room.

            After muffled talking, Denver and Dallas got louder.  Dayton and Orlando grew louder in order to talk over the ten-year olds.  Where are Mom and Daddy?

            When my parents still didn’t arrive to calm down the ruckus going on in the hallway, I decided to take matters into my own hands.  Too lazy to get out of my warm bed, I yelled at the top of my lungs.  “Can ya’ll please just be quiet!”

            Silence.  Complete silence.  Wow, that’s never worked so great before.  But, not just their loud voices had stopped.  It was like everything in the house was frozen in time.  Their voices, the moving of their feet, the air conditioner…everything.  Even the rain had stopped at the raising of my voice. 

            I should have been over the moon to have that much quiet.  Instead, I was scared.  The silence was eery and nerve-wracking.  What was going on?

            Then I heard thunder and breathed a sigh of relief.  Noise.  It flooded my ears and I welcomed the sound.  After the thunder came lightning.  It could see it clearly zoom by out my window that now seemed like it was opened. 

Through the opened window, I could see words.  I couldn’t make out what they were because the lightning suddenly blinded my vision.  I screamed when the bolt of light fell upon the roof. 

The roof completely caved in and I was thrown off my bed by fallen debris.  The pieces of broken material surprisingly didn’t hurt when it landed on me.  Then, all was quiet again.  My eyes remained shut as I lay on the floor of my bedroom.

*****

            When I opened my eyes, everything was back to normal.  I was laying in my bed, the roof was in one piece, and the rain was pouring outside.  I threw my legs over the side of my bed.  I needed to figure out what that was.

            As I walked along the hallway to my parents’ bedroom, I noticed something different.  The pictures on the wall used to be pictures of our family.  All seven of us together over the years.  But now, there were only pictures of my mom, my dad, and I in the same place and time as the other pictures.  Only my brothers were missing.

            I searched every picture on that wall, but the four boys were nowhere to be found.  I rushed into my mom and dad’s room.  My mom was laying in her bed on her computer.  “Where are the boys?”

            “Your father took them outside to go to the bathroom. Bullet almost chewed up my slippers so we decided it was time for them to go outside for a while.”

            I laughed. “No, not the dogs. Where are Orlando, Dayton, Denver, and Dallas?”

            My mom looked up from her computer. “Who?”

            “Ummm… my brothers.”

            She watched me as if I had lost my mind.  “You’ve never had any siblings, Kansas.”

            “What are you talking about? I had four brothers and they slept in those rooms in the hallway and – ”

            “You mean our two guest bedrooms?”

            “I – I…” I didn’t know what to say.  Should I be happy that I didn’t have any brothers anymore?  Or was this just a prank that my mom was in on?  Dayton loved pranks…

            I could tell my mother was telling the truth, but that was just odd.  Then, I smiled when I realized what this meant for me.  A nice, long nap without any nagging brothers keeping me awake.

            As I laid back down to sleep, I checked my phone.  I gasped when I saw the wallpaper of my phone.  It was a picture of me surrounded by my brothers after a basketball game we won a week ago.  That was the only picture in the house that featured them. 

            I took it to my mother.  “This is only a picture of you. What are you trying to show me?”

            “So you can’t see the boys in it?”

            “Not at all. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

            I shook my head, confused.  I showed the picture to my dad who said the same thing as my mom.  Weird.  It was like I was the only one who could see my brothers in it.

*****

The next day after school, I came home and rummaged around for my basketball jersey.  We had a big game in an hour, and I wanted to make sure I had everything ready.

I couldn’t find the green and white jersey anywhere.  I raced to find my mom, but discovered my dad instead.  “Daddy, do you have any idea where my basketball jersey is?”

“Basketball? You haven’t played basketball since the fourth grade when you quit halfway through the season.”

“What? But I’ve played basketball for six years. We have a game tonight, remember?”

“Honey, you wouldn’t have been able to play it even if you had wanted to. You don’t have anyone to help you out at home since I’m too busy with work.”

“Oh. That makes so much sense.” I hurried off to my room before he could say another word and cried.  Dayton had been the athletic one in the family, and since he wasn’t around to help coach me, I gave up basketball after half a season.  Basketball was my life.  Now I couldn’t play it because I didn’t have my brother.

*****

            At school on Tuesday, I received the math test I had taken last Friday.  I was confident in my grade because I had always gotten an A or high B in Algebra.  But, the big D at the top of my page surprised me.  D?

            I looked back over the test.  The answers I had put down were not the ones I remembered.  I wrinkled my nose when I realized that it must have something to do with my missing brothers.  Let’s see if I can figure this one out on my own.

            The answer came to me when I was eating lunch with my best friend.  Orlando was only a year older than my thirteen years, but a genius with numbers and science.  When I started getting terrible math grades in elementary school, he helped me bring my grade up to an A, where it stayed because he was always there to tutor me when necessary.  But without a smart older brother, my grades were not as good.

            I had never realized how much they affected my life.  I mulled over it as I ate my sandwich.

*****

            When I got home, reached for my phone and opened my bedroom windows.  It was a bright, sunny day.  The opposite of my mood.  I pulled up the only remaining picture of me with my brothers.  I stared down at it.  That was a great day. We won the game and my brothers were there to congratulate me and hug me. We all got along.

            I sighed and pushed a lock of dark, brown hair out of my face.  I didn’t know what else to do but to pray.  “God, please bring my brothers back. I miss them so much and didn’t realize how much I took them for granted until they were gone. I love them a lot and really want to see their faces again. Please?”

            I opened my eyes and sighed in exasperation when nothing had happened.  I wracked my brain for a memory of that day that might change something.

            When my window had opened by itself there had been words!  I closed my eyes and concentrated hard on what I had seen.  My photographic memory turned out to be very useful in a time like this.  I bit my lip hard, but when I tasted blood, I let it go. 

            T.  I got one letter.  As I focused on the word in the sky, the letters slowly began to take formation.  THANKFULNESS.  Then, everything began to click into place.  Thankfulness.  I sighed. “God, I promise to be more thankful for the brothers you’ve blessed me with. Thank you for them.”

*****

            I opened my eyes.  I lay in my bed, the rain pouring down on the house in the same pattern it partook in on Sunday.  I was dressed in the same sweatshirt as Sunday, and when I turned my phone on, it confirmed the fact that it was Sunday.

            Did this mean everything had been reversed?  I heard voices in the living room.  Not the voices of my grown parents, but the voices of young boys. 

            I crept out of my room and headed for our living room, noticing that all the pictures on the hallway walls had my brothers in them.  My eyes welcomed the sight of my four brothers sitting on the floor, setting up a game.

            “Come join us, sleepyhead,” Dayton said, gesturing to the game.

            I nodded, my heart filled with joy.  All four brothers were present, and I would never take them for granted again.

*****

Yet another Thanksgiving has arrived!  This week is all about being thankful.  We hear people talking about being thankful all week, but do we really take that to heart?

            Just like Kansas in this story, we don’t realize how much we have until it is all taken away from us.  She never realized how much her brothers affected her life, and that she did not like living without them.

            Now here’s a thought-provoking question: What if you woke up tomorrow morning with only the things you had thanked God for the day before?  I don’t know about you, but I don’t thank God as much as I should.  Kansas had never really taken the time to thank God for her brothers, and once they were gone she missed them more than she thought possible.

I know I take a lot of things for granted like heat, running water, food right in my refrigerator, a comfortable bed, etc.  Did you know that someone on this Earth is praying for all these things we take for granted every day.  God has blessed you with these things that most of the world’s population doesn’t have the privilege of enjoying.

So this week, I challenge you to grab a journal or piece of paper and a pen.  Make a list of everything that you’re thankful for and pray it to God.  Be specific with this.  Name the things that you are truly grateful to have this holiday season.  I believe that once you acknowledge what you are thankful for, your attitude will be one of thankfulness to the Lord. 
Whatever you do this week, remember that God loves you no matter what!