At this time of thanksgiving, I am thankful for many things. Most of all, I am thankful for my family. I was blessed with 7 children. After we had three boys naturally, we were told we could have no more children. We decided to adopt and were blessed with three girls and one boy. One of the blessings of adopting was the fact that the adopted children all came from different racial groups. That meant that my children could not develop racial stereotypes. If they did, they had a brother or sister that was that racial group. As a result, my children have brought home friends of every color. That has been a real blessing. We have gotten many strange looks from people but overall it has been good.

My children tell stories of how their friends expect us to be the same race as they are. So, when their friends come over for the first time, they are surprised to find a big white guy opening the door. They were expecting someone who was, black, Hispanic, etc. It has been told and retold of their friend’s reaction to having me open the door.

I am also thankful that my children are starting families. I have 5 granddaughters and 3 grandsons. We are raising one of the granddaughters as one of our daughters. She knows we are her grandparents, yet she calls us mom and dad. The others are all being raised by their parents. My only regret is that my sons have not have had any sons. That means that the Revie name will not continue past my grandchildren’s generation, unless my sons have more children that are boys. Right now, that does not look too promising. My adopted son is the most likely to have another child. He tells me that it will be a son. He has been wrong twice, we shall see.

I am also thankful to be born in America. I have had wonderful opportunities to do what I wanted to do and go where I wanted to go. I have not been everywhere I wanted to go, but I am content that I could have if I could have afforded it.

I had the opportunity to serve my church for two years in England. I told the people there that it was to penance for my ancestors. They were Vikings and Scots. The Vikings and Scots raided and killed a lot of people in England. My time in England was wonderful. I came to love the English people. I also came to understand English humor and English Football (soccer). That has enriched my life and the life of my family for the past 35 years.

I have a good education. I am smart enough to have been educated in almost any society. But, here I could choose for myself what I wanted to study. The study in college, lead me to lead a life that was full and eventful. My work involved helping farmers and ranchers. I was outside for much of the time. I enjoy being outside. I also love rural areas with lots of open space. I had that for much of my working career. That was enjoyable and fulfilling.

I believe in the American ideals of individualism and freedom. I object when people try to take away my freedom and the freedom of my children and grandchildren. I did not serve in the military. I did go down to enlist. My draft number was 28. The government was drafting people up to about 180. I knew I would be drafted and be a private in the Army. I preferred being an officer like my father. During the enlistment I took a written test and got the highest score that day. That would put me on the short list to be an officer. I then took the physical and complained about my knees hurting. I had played a basketball game the night before and they hurt a lot. The doctor took an X-Ray of my knees and told me I would have them operated on within 10 years. He was close to being right. I had my first knee operation 11 years later. I have had 3 operations on my left knee and one on my right. The Army reclassified me as 1-Y. As a 1-Y, the Army did not want me to enlist. I could have been drafted, but only as office help. Later they reclassified all 1-Y people as 4-F. During that time I was in England serving a mission for my church and was 4-D (minister’s deferment). When I got home, the draft board never reclassified me from 4-D to 4-F.

I am also thankful that we have freedom of religion in this country. I am thankful that I have the opportunity to worship as I choose and others have the same opportunity. I do understand that Democrats and liberals are working to take that away. The Islamo-Fascists want everyone to be Muslim or dead. But for now, I am free to worship as I choose and I am taking full advantage of that right.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and we will be having family over for Turkey and football. The house will be full of people so I will not be anywhere near a computer for the holiday. Enjoy your Thanksgiving holiday and worship as you choose.