I am grateful.

Early this morning, while drinking an espresso and eating a pain au chocolat, still in the spirit of gratitude, I thought about the joy I had in the life I was able to experience. I was taking my espresso at an extremely touristy café at St. Michel on a Sunday morning. This is the kind of thing every true Parisian avoids like the plague. However, I needed an espresso, so I took a seat. I noticed that the only people around me were from everywhere but France. There is no doubt, had I been on vacation, I would have been sat right there as well, and in fact have sat in places like that all of Europe, and the Americas. And, so often, I was just a tourist peering just over breakfast trying to catch a glimpse of what life was like living in a totally different culture. This is the curse of the tourist. They get to see a place and they in most cases (especially Paris for me) they get just enough to know that they want more. They want to know more than just what Mona Lisa looks like in person. They want to know what it is like to walk past the Louvre and around a corner to that little place off the main street that has the best baguettes in the city. They want to know what it is like to be a fixture at the café on the corner that may not even be the best coffee in the world, or the best food in the world, but it is there that they are a regular. It is there they do some of their best thinking and maybe even their truest loneliness. But, it is a place that they go day in and day out no matter what life has thrown their way, because it is their café and it is there that they are comfortable. They know when it is open and when it is closed (this is actually quite a difficult task in France, and quite frustrating for a foreigner). Although I was sat in a touristy cafe and this was not my regular café, I was beginning to learn after several months what it was like to actually live out these dreams and begin to answer the question, "what would it be like if I lived there?"
I was quite thankful this morning in that moment because God has given me the opportunity to begin to answer that question. He has given me the protection and strength to walk through the toughest parts fo the answer of that question. He has given me hope in the loneliest hours that this too shall pass. He has filled me with wonder and awe at the seemingly simplest things, but the simplest things that you only get to experience when you actually live in a foreign country where they don't speak your language or follow your customs. You realize that not only is your house not the center of the world, but neither is your city, your state, your country or even your own language. You are in a place where you have to work to be understood and heard. It does not come easily or naturally but with time and patience it can come. With strength and hope from God your Creator you can begin to speak and, even more love in a way you never thought possible because you have become less and God has become more. I know this may not be the experience of all expatriates, but it has certainly been mine. Its not that I even asked God to show me these things but he has done because he is good and he does love. The hardest part that I have with even writing that last sentence is that I can only begin to understand what these things truly mean. It is greater than my small short-sided egocentric versions of them. It is for all these things and many more that I am truly thankful for this Thanksgiving.