I’ve been thanking people a lot lately. I’ve been thanking people, not God, not the Universe, not “the force that through the green fuse drives the flower.”

I’ve been thanking the bagger at the grocery store and the delivery guy who brought me food and warm pajamas when I was holed up in an Airbnb with covid last summer. I’ve been thanking the 61-year-old man who’s climbing ladders to paint my house right now — turning it into a work of art.

I’ve been going out of my way to thank people in recent months, and I’m wondering why.

Gratitude Is a Thing

Gratitude — big, intentional, generalized gratitude — is on trend these days. Its spiritual and stress reduction benefits are widely touted. Your yoga instructor will recommend it. So will your pastor, your doctor, your therapist, your best friend.

Gratitude is an adaptable, one-size-fits-all practice. You don’t have to be religious to practice it. You can also be religious and do it.

But gratitude of the expansive, generalized, soft-focus type is not what I’m talking about here. I’m talking about an unsolicited impulse I’ve been feeling lately to thank people — strangers — for specific deeds, large and small. For bagging my groceries. For bringing the pick-up truck to a full stop so I can cross the street unperturbed. For painting my house.

Thanking People for Being There

I find that, these days, I am noticeably touched when someone does something for me, so I want them to feel thoroughly thanked for what they’ve done. I want them to feel thanked for just being there.

I didn’t set out to feel this way. None of this was my idea. I am not claiming any high moral ground here. This is not virtue I’m talking about. Far from it. This is something that has been happening to me.

What gives?

I’m suspecting:

• Covid. It’s just so nice to be back in the grocery store, where the check-out clerk is standing so close you can actually look her in the eye and see her eyes. You want to thank her for having eyes.
• Widowed. My 24/7 companion is gone. Some days it’s just me all day, so twenty-four hours of human interaction gets crammed into that one thank-you at the check-out counter. Which makes it a thank-you I can’t toss off lightly.
• Aging. How many more trips to the supermarket do I have left anyway? This one could be the last. Squeeze it for all its worth.
• Those people I’ve been thanking. It has dawned on me recently that people actually like doing things for other people, including me. The painter who’s painting my house right now is getting paid, of course. But I get the feeling that he likes painting my house. He likes creating something beautiful. He likes being able to give me that gift. I thank him.

Religion scholar Huston Smith lived to be an old guy. Here’s what he wanted to say toward the end of his life — “Be Happy!”   As for feeling gratitude toward Nature with a capital N, check out “Nature. We Love It. But Does It Love Us?”