I cannot promise you that this is the last holiday essay I’ll write this year. I’ll do my best to be both heartwarming and snarky, but the likelihood that I can maintain that delicate balance is kind of slim.
The world is in a parlous state nowadays (“parlous” – there’s a great word; it’s a shame that it’s always bad news when you have an opportunity to use it). There’s someone out on the Web worrying about whether Switzerland might go bankrupt. Switzerland. That’s where money’s supposed to go to hide, not to vanish without a trace. We can celebrate low gas prices, I suppose, but all they mean is that the economy is in the crapper.
What stable footing can we stand on in such times? We’ve already exerted, as a nation, whatever control we can over this mess – we’ve tossed out the culprits on their ears and turned the reins over to someone else. But in the face of GM going under, the stock market tanking, employment falling off a cliff, well, I’m proud of voting, but 150 million paddles aren’t about to stop a tidal wave.
And yet. The circle of years brings us, once again, to Thanksgiving. Sure, the Christmas decorations are already in the stores, and we haven’t even slaughtered the turkeys yet, but I’m still determined to reflect on how lucky, truly lucky, we are.
We live in one of the wealthiest, most diverse, most resourceful countries in the world. We’re reasonably well educated, reasonably healthy, reasonably fairly governed. We have tremendous intellectual resources, spectacular natural beauty. Some of us lucked out by being born here; some people worked long and hard to come here from elsewhere. Compared to fifty years ago, we’re far smarter and wiser about civil rights, the environment, mental health. Here in Boston, we live in a beautiful, historic city, rich in culture and education. I still, still, after all these years, get a little misty when I come home from a long trip and see “Boston” on the highway signs.
One of the reasons, of course, is all of you, and all of us who entertain you. Just last night, I went to see Susan Levine at Perk’s in Norwood. She was splitting an evening with Chris Elliot and Lisa Austin, and at one point, they were reminiscing about having met each other ten years ago, just when Susan got to Boston. And that, of course, is when I met all of them myself, all those years ago. Ten years of open mikes, and open mike features, and gigs, and song circles, ten years of a craft that’s incredibly rewarding, and absolutely impossible without people to perform with, and learn from, and listen.
I wasn’t born here. In fact, I came here by accident – I chose Boston because I’d visited a friend in Duxbury over Thanksgiving break my freshman year, and we’d passed through Harvard Square on the way to his house, and I thought to myself, “This is nice.” I graduated from college, and had nowhere in particular to go, and came here, because of a fifteen-minute visit. Virtually everything I treasure, virtually everything I’m proud of, was a result of that accident; not only would I never have met my wife, She Who Must Be Taunted, but this city is also arguably the best place in the country to pursue my chosen profession, which keeps a roof over my head, and to pursue my chosen avocation, such is the variety of depth of musical talent here. (Sure, maye I would have landed in Santa Fe, and married a Native American and become a gifted jewelry designer, but frankly, I can’t see it.)
I don’t want to suggest that I think everything is perfect – not by a long shot. But when I think about all the work that needs to be done, I like to think about it from a position of pride and humility, rather than contempt. After all, the world’s gotta be worth fixing. So I make a point of being thankful. Every day, actually. My good fortune in my life is frankly humbling, and I can’t imagine justifying feeling sorry for myself. A long time ago, I wrote a song called “A Bigger Glass of Empty”, and it says pretty much everything I want to say about my understanding of my place in the world:
The people with a bigger glass of empty
Dog my days
They’re so much more deserving of my pity
In oh, so many ways
I’ve had my ounce of misery and pain
Spit a Dixie cup of luck counterclockwise down the drain
I’d give anything to cry over this two-bit tragedy
But there are people with a bigger glass of empty
Than me
Happy Thanksgiving, everybody. Go to an open mike. Hug the host. Put some money in the hat. It’ll only cost you a couple bucks, in this awful economy, and it’ll remind you why we’re here.