Notebook
By Erin Deborah Waks
The rain, when it’s equally inconvenient and beautiful. Having a best friend I can talk to for eight hours straight without getting bored. Spaghetti aglio olio, especially when my brother makes it. Any time anyone reads anything I write. Pilates in the morning, mostly when it makes my legs tremble but I still have the strength to power through. A really good dirty martini. Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier. Heartburn by Nora Ephron. Peanut butter, on its own or on toast, combined with cinnamon and bananas. My ability to know myself and communicate myself with others. Pilot episodes of great TV shows. Obviously, coffee.
Something nobody knows about me is that every morning I write down three things I’m grateful for in the same notebook. It’s all I use it for. Open it to any page and you’ll see the date and three random bullet points. Sometimes they’re big things - my job, my health, the people I love. Other times they’re the tiny parts of my day I’m grateful for, like brunch, a singular compliment someone gave me or a minor accomplishment.
For me, expressing gratitude is akin to meditation. It makes me conscious of all the things in my life that are beautiful, that are good. An antidote to the scary or horrible things that happen. When I have a bad day at work, I’m still grateful for the Thai food I may order that evening. When I fight with a friend, I’m still grateful I surround myself with people I love enough to work through any hard times. When I’m stiff from a run, I’m still grateful to my body, for letting me move, for giving me an outlet for stress, for allowing me to use movement to improve my mental headspace.
It’s so easy to thank other people when they do obvious things - like buying you flowers or going out of their way to do you a favour. But it’s not in the extraordinary that I find joy. It’s in the gratitude expressed for the ordinary, the mundane, that I recognise the beauty that can be found in small things. Thanking someone for listening to a minor rant. For being on time to something important. For checking in with you every so often.
So yes, I love birthday presents, fancy dinners and elaborate displays of affection. But breakfast in bed with my coffee made exactly the way I like it and my favourite hoodie on? No prizes for guessing which makes it into my notebook more often.
