Make Sure to Give Thanks

Today I am pretty much doing the happy dance. My son will be home for thanksgiving in a few hours and it will be his first time home since leaving in August for college. I am ecstatic, I am on cloud nine, life is good. But as I feel all these emotions and I am overjoyed my thoughts can't help but go to those mothers who will have an empty place at their table this year, and it may be for the first time or it may have been for the 10th but it is empty regardless. I am thinking of the mothers who will be missing a child that was lost because their child paid the ultimate sacrifice for us, so we could sit around the table of freedom and give thanks for all our blessings, because they did that for us. I know there are also those who lost husbands, boyfriends, girlfriends, sister and brothers and their grief is deep and lonely and I know they also will be missing their loved one but as a mother, who is missing her child, and who is blessed enough to have him home with me in a few hours that is who I am thinking of, the mothers. So tomorrow as you give thanks for your family and your blessings and your life, please give thanks for those who laid down for us their lives and think of the Gold Star Mothers who will forever look across that table and feel an ache in their hearts.