Can I Be Grateful Enough?

I'm grateful for the robins who hop around in the thin grass outside my back door and for the mockingbirds who sing and whistle while I hang my clothes up on the line. And I give thanks for the sun, by the way, who dries my clothes and peeks capriciously into the windows of my house when it's out. There are five seats in my home where you might sit directly in its light, if you can catch it. 

There are 18 places for the two of us to sit at my house, plus two on the front porch and four on the back. I appreciate the fact that we and our guests have places to rest, eat, and work comfortably.

I'm grateful that we can afford the price of admission to the zoo: it's gone up. They've installed a new section, where we are lucky enough to see grizzly bears, bison and a condor - and sometimes wolves at feeding time - living in relatively spacious captivity. There is a gondola that carries us grandly up to where they live.
 

One day I watched in awe when all the giraffes at the zoo galloped in a circle around the edge of the pen, their long necks rocking to the rhythm of the pounding of their hooves. What harmony, what solidarity they displayed that day! I think it must have been feeding time.

It's different seeing animals in the wild. I'm grateful that on my trip to Costa Rica I've seen red-and-black tanagers, bright blue-and-turquoise honeycreepers, two crocodiles and their newly-hatched baby, toucans in flight with their big awkward beaks, and languid iguanas, all free to go where they please, although some came to us because someone was feeding them so that we could have the pleasure of seeing them. I'm grateful that we in our special tour for older, slower-moving people can see macaws, looking like streaks of paint - crimson, green, yellow and blue - swiping through the air to settle on a ledge and eat out of our hands; and hummingbirds like tiny flying jewels dipping their beaks into feeders of sugar water; all included in the hefty price of the tour. The lovely open dining room in Punta Leona is draped with netting that the white-faced monkeys can climb up and bounce on after they eat the fruit put out for them by the staff. There's even a mother monkey with her baby clinging to her back! It's a magical moment. We still love good magic, we oldsters.

When I walk around and discover wild creatures myself, I'm filled with awe and delight. A poison dart frog, shiny green with black spots, revealed itself to me one morning, an unexpected gift. Later I watched an iguana clamber onto a log to warm itself, morning sun lighting up its crest. Animals, just being themselves, regardless of me.

That an air-conditioned bus smooths out the bumpy roads so I can take a walk through the rain forest on a paved trail; and see a volcano and some monkeys, eat a gourmet meal and watch a curassow give a piece of banana to his mate while a coati paces and begs below them waiting for whatever scraps they might drop: for that I'm grateful. I'm so grateful that we have our jolly white-haired guide Jorge, and our sweet, smart young guide Wendy to show us and tell us about all the animals. Their understanding of these animals is deep, having known them all their lives. Their English is almost flawless, and they're patient with my Spanish. I'll never forget their joy and their kindness. I'm thankful for our bus driver, who can spot howler monkeys and sloths way up in the trees, where we see nothing but leaves. My heart is full.

It's exciting when the rain suddenly starts up with its message from the sky, then stops so we can ponder it. I'm thankful for good weather and not too much rain for our vacation. It will rain a lot when we're gone, so Costa Rica can continue to be lush and green.

I'm grateful for the hearts-of-palm ceviche, salad, and dessert. Fifty palmetto trees, expertly stripped down to their small, soft hearts, went into that luncheon for the twenty of us. Two-and-a-half trees per person! The woman who owns the palm plantation showed us how she uses a machete to reveal the hearts. She came from nothing.

I'm grateful that I didn't have to pick coffee beans when I was a kid, like our guide Jorge did, to earn money to buy a bicycle. Mine just appeared under the Christmas tree one year. Our Wendy picked coffee beans to pay for school supplies. I see their pride in their youthful capability.

I'm grateful that although I carelessly buy a bottle of sunblock that cost $30, I can still have twice as much food as I can eat placed in front of me that night. I like the little towel animals that the housekeepers make to greet us when we come back from our adventures. I appreciate that when I choose not to put my iPod in the safe, and a housekeeper or someone steals it, I can go right to my smartphone and order a new one on Amazon.

I owe thanks to the Costa Ricans who have had to give up some of their farming, ranching and lumber business to protect the rainforest and allow it to reabsorb some of the carbon we've exhaled like puffs of toxic smoke into the atmosphere. Our ecotourism takes their place in the economy.

The beach we visit is littered with shards of coral, bleached white as bones. The brilliant macaws fly from tree to tree above us.

Maybe soon there will be a better world, that is, unless there is no world. In the better world maybe coral reefs and giraffes will survive. The cost of the damage done by carbon will be folded into the price, and carbon-producing things, like jet fuel for instance, will cost more. Fewer greenhouse gases will be emanated by planes full of people who, in this current world, expect to fly somewhere nice every year or two. In this more just world, there will be fewer curious, good-natured retired folks who can afford to support the hummingbird gardens and jungle-themed resorts that allow Costa Rica to safeguard the tropical flora and fauna from the ravages of climate change, and to provide opportunities for their people. Will anyone give this lovely country money for those noble purposes, when we - most of us - can no longer afford to be drawn in, to feast our eyes on their wild spectacular birds and animals and jungle?

This will be my last trip to Costa Rica, maybe to anywhere this far away. How can I give enough thanks that I get to see it all? I'm seeing it from the backs of people who work very hard for very little - not just the Costa Ricans, but also the people of China and Mexico and Bangladesh, who make our trinkets and clothes and iPhones. I found my iPod, by the way; I'd put it in a hidden compartment and forgotten. It happens. Now I'll have two.

And I have robins and mockingbirds and a yard. I try to understand the blessing I received when I was born white in the United States. I'm grateful, but I'm only one person and I owe so much: to my parents, to the people who grow and harvest and serve our food, to those who made the airplanes and taught us we could fly through the sky and see the world.

The weight of my gratitude feels, at times, like too much for one person; but I do my best.

Thank you.