Day 68: The Gratitude Attitude of Others

Gratitude spreads like a contagion you want to receive. And when others I read or hear or know express gratitude I am prompted in my own heart and life to express it as well. Their gratefulness for things and people prompt me to think outside of the box I so often get stuck in regarding gratefulness. Sometimes it is as if once I have run through the generalities of being grateful for "food, clothes, shelter" I can't figure out what to be grateful for when in reality I need, and it is a true need, to get below the generalities and get specific. That's probably why I liked the prompt I followed for yesterday's Gratitude Attitude. A dear friend, Crystal, posted this poem on gratitude last night after I went to bed. It moved me to use it as my Gratitude Attitude for today, her thoughts on gratefulness prompted my gratefulness. And for that prompt I am...grateful. :)

Thankful month,
Thankful Thursdays,
Thankful, just thankful,
I wonder when we started designating a specific time to be thankful?
Gratitude keeps one sober.
Gratitude keeps one happy.
We should teach thankfulness in Kinder...
We should say thank you at all times.
But I say this in deep regret that I do not say thank you as often as I should.
It is a very vulnerable thing for me to do.
Some how I am afraid of it.
Yet my heart screams thanks.
I say it different.
I cook.
I clean.
I serve.
I think this year I will learn to say thank you aloud!
So thank you!
(Crystal Cates-Alvillar)

Butter someone up

There are two probable origins for this idiom and I think both are equally plausible. The first one is that when you spread butter on bread you are buttering it up like one would do when trying to flatter someone. The second is in ancient India there was a practice of throwing balls of butter at statues to ask for favor, i.e. buttering them up. ( source ) When we use the phrase today we generally mean that extreme flattery is used to gain information or favor. It's not always necessarily a compliment.

Call it a Day

The literal use of this phrase hails from 1838 when the phrase originally was "call it half a day" to mean leaving work early. (source) The modern use of the phrase is to indicate ending something due to false sense of accomplishment.

More bang for your buck

This phrase was used a lot in 1953 but an earlier citation puts it at 1940 in a Metals and Plastics Publications advertisement. Read about it here . The phrase means you get more for your money.

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