2023 Thanksgiving Thankful List

2023 Thanksgiving Thankful List

– By Tom Garrison –

Each November, I compose a “Thanksgiving Thankful List” for the preceding year. My wife, Deb, and I enjoy our life in Red Rock, southern Utah, and have many things for which we are thankful. I hope sharing them brings a smile and acknowledgment that even the seldom thought of can be a source of thankfulness. Below is my 2023 list.

1. I’m thankful for national parks. Remember the first time you drove into Zion National Park? Or walked to the edge of the Grand Canyon and looked into the abyss? For me, at least, those are genuine “wow!” moments. What nature creates in places like Zion and the Grand Canyon, and humans thankfully protect, is something to celebrate.
2. Everyone should be grateful the earth is in the Goldilocks zone. What is the Goldilocks zone? It is the zone of potential planetary orbits that, like Goldilocks porridge, is not too hot nor too cold.

In astrobiology, the Goldilocks zone refers to the habitable zone around a star: As Stephen Hawking put it, “like Goldilocks, the development of intelligent life requires that planetary temperatures be ‘just right.’” The Rare Earth Hypothesis uses the Goldilocks principle in the argument that a planet must neither be too far away from, nor too close to a star and galactic center to support life, while either extreme would result in a planet incapable of supporting life. Such a planet is colloquially called a “Goldilocks Planet.” Paul Davies has argued for the extension of the principle to cover the selection of our universe from a (postulated) multiverse, “observers arise only in those universes where, like Goldilocks’ porridge, things are by accident ‘just right.’”

3. I’m glad the weekend is only two days. Imagine if it was longer, say three days. By the third day, you would finally relax and master the intricacies of being a couch potato. Then, the fourth day comes, and it’s back to reality. Will you be able to gear up for work?

A two-day weekend is just long enough to slow down a bit but not so long as to increase the difficulty of reentering the real world.

4. I’m thankful for the acute senses of cats, particularly our cats, Bob and Willa. If you are familiar with cats, you know they occasionally have an intense focus on seemingly nothing. What they are sensing, and what our puny human senses cannot detect, is an electromagnetic disturbance in space-time. The smart cat parent will avoid these areas of cat focus.

Fortunately, these disturbances are usually harmless to cats and humans. But, occasionally, a human or cat will get sucked into the space-time disruption.

You’ve probably heard of the rare human or cat that disappears and is never seen again. Now you know what happened.

5. I’m thankful I live in the northern hemisphere. Things make sense here. North is toward the Arctic and the North Pole. And there is no way I could get used to clocks running backwards – wait, what? Are you sure clocks run backwards in the southern hemisphere? Well, forget the clocks.
6. I’m glad Deb and I both seem to have the “explorer gene.” For example, in 2009 (we were both in our late 50s,) we moved to St. George from Santa Barbara, California. We did not know a soul in southwest Utah (or the entire state, for that matter). And we had no jobs waiting for us. We simply packed up and left California. In addition, for more than 35 years now, we have explored all over the American Southwest—more than 230 different hikes (yes, I have a list). Often, these adventures took us waay out in the middle of nowhere, 15 miles of bad dirt road just to reach the trailhead—exploring.

Is there really an “explorer gene?” Researchers have isolated a gene called DRD4, which controls dopamine, a chemical brain messenger important to learning and reward. A variant of DRD4, known as DRD4-7R, which is carried by approximately 20 percent of the population, has been closely linked with increased curiosity and restlessness. Repeated studies have shown that the presence of 7R makes people more likely to “take risks, explore new places, ideas, food, relationships, drugs, or sexual opportunities; and generally embrace movement, change, and adventure. Studies in animals simulating 7R’s actions suggest it increases their taste for both movement and novelty.”

I hope everyone recalls the many things, obvious and not so obvious, to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.