What
we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others lasts. Sometimes
it only takes a moment to reach out to be a friend but to the one who needs
us, the memory never ends. Let us be grateful to those who love us; to
those who make us happy. Gratitude
unfolds the goodness of life; it brings out the best in us. The story that
follows
is a true story of a grateful whale as reported in the San Francisco
Chronicle.
If
you read the front page story of the San Francisco Chronicle on Thursday, Dec
15, 2005, you would have read about a female humpback whale who had become
entangled in a spider web of crab traps and lines.
The fifty-foot whale was weighted down by hundreds of pounds of traps that
caused her to struggle to stay afloat. She also had hundreds of yards of line
rope wrapped around her tail, her torso and a line tugging in her mouth.
A
fisherman
spotted her just east of the Farallone Islands (outside the Golden Gate) and
radioed an environmental group for help. Within a few hours, the rescue team
arrived and determined that she was so bad off, the only way to save her was to
dive in and untangle her - a very dangerous proposition. One slap of the tail
could kill a rescuer.
They worked
for hours with curved knives and eventually freed her. When she was free, the
divers say she swam in what seemed like joyous circles. She then came back to
each and every diver, one at a time, and nudged them, pushed them gently around
- she thanked them. Some said it was the most incredibly beautiful experience of
their lives.
The
guy who cut the rope out of her mouth says her eye was following him the whole
time, and he will never be the same.
May you, and all those you love, be so blessed and fortunate in the New Year -to
be surrounded by people who will help you get untangled from the things that are
binding you.
And, may you always know the joy of giving and receiving gratitude.
When
we get tangled up in our problems, be still.
God
wants us to be still so He can untangle the knot.
For today and its blessings, I owe the world an attitude of gratitude. |
Tim
|