Amid the bustle of the holiday season, take a minute to count your blessings | Opinion

As we get caught up in the mad hustle and bustle of the holiday season, I find myself slowing down, rather than rushing.

I am slowing down to grasp more than a spirit of shopping and rushing about. My goal now, is to find more ways to make this a season of gratitude. I do this by thinking of some of the many ways I have been blessed throughout my life.

So, I took a little trip down memory lane, remembering some of the things that I am thankful for. It is not hard for me to think back to the lean days of my life. I don’t find it hard to remember when I literally did not know where my next meal was coming from. But I gave thanks to God for the meal that was before me and my then-little boys. Although times were hard, somehow, we never went to bed hungry.

Now it’s Thanksgiving time, when most of us turn our thoughts to what makes us thankful. While there is no way for me to count all the blessings that I am thankful for, just the thought of how far I have come in life fills me with enough gratitude to last another lifetime.

Like many of my Black friends, I grew up not knowing I was poor. That’s because our mom always saw to it that we had a roof over our heads, decent clothes to wear, and food on the table. And snacks, too.

Mom knew how to “cut corners” as she used to say. In other words, she knew how to stretch a meal. Like many of her friends, she knew how to make a feast out of the cheaper cut of meat.

Grits, butter and a can of mackerel

I was thinking of those lean times and how learning from my mother helped me when I became a young wife and mom.

One of my favorite stories is the memory of a can of mackerel, a small bag of grits, and a stick of butter. Rick, my firstborn (now deceased) was just over a year old. My late husband was attending Kentucky State College on the G.I. Bill while I stayed behind and worked to support myself and Rick.

It wasn’t easy. After I paid the rent, the babysitter, and bought baby formula, a few groceries and other necessities out of my meager salary, often the food didn’t stretch to the next payday.

Then I remembered how my mom used to “cut corners,” and my cooking genius kicked in.

I usually had enough money left over to get a can of mackerel (about 19 cents in 1959), a small bag of grits and a stick of butter. I got the idea to sauté an onion in a bit of oil and add the canned mackerel and some seasoning to the pan, and let it stew for several minutes. I served the fish stew over a plate of hot, buttered grits. It was good eating, ya’ll.

The can of mackerel, the bag of grits and the stick of butter became our daily meal for a while. Rick, then a toddler of about 18 months, loved it. I can still see him smacking his little lips as I fed him. And I can still smell the glorious aroma of the stewed fish and onions.

Until the day Rick died, nine years ago at age 55, one of his favorite meals was stewed fish and grits. Just thinking of this memory from over 60 years ago still makes me thankful.

Sometimes when my thoughts wander over the road I have traveled on this journey, I become overwhelmed with gratitude and tears well up in my eyes.

Especially when I think back to the way I got the job at The Miami Herald. To me, it was nothing short of a miracle.

Landed job at the Herald

Back in early1965, I applied for a salesclerk’s position at the Sears, Roebuck and Co. department store, then at 13th Street and Biscayne Boulevard. Back then, even the businesses that were hiring Blacks had a “quota” of only hiring a certain number of Blacks.

On that fateful day, I went into Sears’ employment department and asked for a job. I was given a simple test, which I was certain that I’d passed. But after a couple of weeks, and I hadn’t heard from the store, I asked one of the employees I knew to find out why I had not heard back. His answer crushed me: “They said you didn’t pass the test.”

In my heart, I knew that I had passed the test. But I picked up my ego up from the floor, thanked the Lord anyway, and searched the want ads in the newspaper the next Sunday. It seemed the more I tried to find a better job with benefits, the more I heard the word “No.” My faith kept me praying for a better job, while thanking the Lord for my blessing that I just knew was on the way.

And one fine Sunday, I saw the ad for a file clerk in the library of The Miami Herald. The ad had the magic words “We are an equal opportunity employer.” I applied, was hired, and my life was changed forever.

You see, I didn’t get the job at Sears because that wasn’t in God’s plan for me. He had something better for my future. I had learned to be thankful for whatever state I was in. Being thankful was a way of life for me. It helped me to keep hope alive in my heart. Is it always easy to give thanks when we are hurting? No. It isn’t. Still, I have learned that being thankful, even when I am in pain, helps to ease the pain.

Reasons to be thankful

Even so, dear friends, while I am yet a work in progress, being thankful is second nature to breathing to me. Yet I ask the Lord to keep these not-so-small miracles of my life ever present in my thoughts. I don’t want to ever forget the valleys that the Lord has walked through with me. Nor do I want to forget the hills and mountain of my life that He has helped me to climb over, or the rivers of life that He has helped me to forge through.

So, friends, while you are seeking ways to have the best Thanksgiving table ever, or where to get the perfect gift for a loved one, let me encourage you to take just a minute to look back over your life. When you do, I am sure that — just like me — you will find so much to be thankful for.

Have a blessed Thanksgiving.

Bea Hines can be reached at Bea.Hines@gmail.com