Thankful

"Thank you and thank YOU ... thank you ... hey, thanks ... thank you SO much!" Carson went around the yard, laying hands on trees and rocks, waving to the sky, and laying on the lawn (giving the earth a hug). Uncle Jack and Aunt Mavis joined Shelley at the window. "We're giving thanks to the world and everything in it; he does this every year," she explained. "Well, that is about the cutest gosh darn thing ever," Jack whispered, shaking his head. "He should be wearing a scarf," Mavis added (and Shelley smiled, but said nothing). "How long's he gonna be?" Jack asked, staring out and grinning from ear to ear. "I might get my coat and join him!" "You will do no such thing!" Mavis corrected him. "You'd get a lung infection." Shelley took a big sip of her coffee, her eyes watching Carson thank a squirrel twitching away on the neighbor's fence. "He thinks thanking the world is really the very least that he can do," she said softly, "seeing as how watching the human race go on is just non-stop bad reality television." Jack laughed and Mavis pursed her lips, moving to the table to grab a cinnamon donut hole.