Thankful for shovels and such

Like this, only with lots of snow and the rest of the driveway 
leading from the main road to the gate.

It's Sunday. I woke up at 6:30. Why? I can't sleep when there's unfinished business. I made my way through the grayness to open the blinds and saw snow, snow, and more snow... 4 inches of fresh snow over the slushed ice. After my worship I pulled on my boots, a hat, some gloves and my new nano puffy patagonia jacket (my favorite part about this winter). I've never minded shoveling, actually I like it because you can't think about anything else, just snow removal. As a born and raised Coloradan, I have lots of experience shoveling snow, so this is nothing new. When my parents were at my house in College Place for Thanksgiving they bought me a shovel and I was excited for the chance to finally use it. So I began at my front door and made my way to the front gate. Blasted plastic shovel, it was super flimsy and took a lot of inner core to blaze a thin path that left a good inch of snow still in its path. After 10 minutes of shoveling with a bendable shovel I felt 5 again, the age when I wanted to do everything my dad was doing. I had my own little (fake and plastic) tools to work along his side, and that's how I felt with the plastic shovel. Cute and unproductive only 21 and not 5. It was making me angry, my insides told me to scream at 7 in the morning. So I threw the shovel down. Blasted shovel, I hate you, I hate this snow, I hate this driveway, I hate it all! So now what... I stand there, steaming mad, staring at my shovel and the rest of the driveway. Just prior to my shoveling experience I had read this during my worship: "Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more... It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. It turns problems into gifts, failures into successes, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events." - Melody Beattie And I had written in my prayer journal that I was going to really try to have loads of gratitude and be thankful in all circumstances. What was I doing then? I'd already forgotten what I had agreed to work on. BAH! Now mad at myself I picked up my shovel... I'm thankful for the snow, it cleans the earth. Thankful for this flimsy shovel, because it means I am physically fit. Thankful for my driveway, because it leads to my home. It shouldn't have been so hard to be thankful this Thanksgiving season. There's so much to be thankful for. But it was a hard lesson to learn today.