What am I thankful for? I am thankful for a lot of things, I must say. I am thankful for good health; I am thankful for the food I will share and eat with my family, and I am thankful for this job that allows me to, among other things, share cool poems in my editorial column, which is basically an analog version of a Substack page, if I had to explain it to my Gen Z contemporaries.

On a wider note, 2025 has been a doozy of a year in my opinion, and part of what makes Thanksgiving such a special holiday is that it allows us all to take a deep breath (preferably after eating our jumbo slice of pumpkin pie) and take a look at just how far we’ve all come in the 11 months that have passed. If you’ve still reading this column, congratulations! You’ve made it to November, just like me and this newspaper. Pat yourself on the back, and help yourself to some mac and cheese; life is too short to be lactose intolerant.

Thanksgiving Ella Wheeler Wilcox We walk on starry fields of white And do not see the daisies; For blessings common in our sight We rarely offer praises.

We sigh for some supreme delight To crown our lives with splendor, And quite ignore our daily store Of pleasures sweet and tender.

Our cares are bold and push their way Upon our thought and feeling.

They hand about us all the day, Our time from pleasure stealing.

So unobtrusive many a joy We pass by and forget it, But worry strives to own our lives, And conquers if we let it.

There’s not a day in all the year But holds some hidden pleasure, And looking back, joys oft appear To brim the past’s wide measure.

But blessings are like friends, I hold, Who love and labor near us.

We ought to raise our notes of praise While living hearts can hear us.

Full many a blessing wears the guise Of worry or of trouble; Far-seeing is the soul, and wise, Who knows the mask is double.

But he who has the faith and strength To thank his God for sorrow Has found a joy without alloy To gladden every morrow.

We ought to make the moments notes Of happy, glad Thanksgiving; The hours and days a silent phrase Of music we are living.

And so the theme should swell and grow As weeks and months pass o’er us, And rise sublime at this good time, A grand Thanksgiving chorus.

Andrea Gutierrez is the managing editor of the Bryan County News.