Thanksgiving Day: In sports as in life, gratitude feeds spirit, soul

We are not an especially devout family but once a year, at our Thanksgiving table, out of character but full of gratitude, I say grace. For me it is a simple expression of how full my heart feels, and my gratitude for being so lucky to look out around a table full of food and the people I love most.

I have no doubt every year that my family and guests end up rolling eyes worrying I might not wrap it up before the mashed potatoes go cold. Near the end last year one of my sons with good nature murmured, “And in closing...” to a soft chuckle from the table.

Love is free and you can feel as much as you want. Same with hope, and appreciation, and optimism. Most of the good things that feed the heart are ours in abundance, if we will just let them in.

Thanksgiving Day for me is the best of all holidays. Not for the banquet of food (but that, too). Not for the smorgasbord of football (but that, too). Not even just for the family. Thanksgiving for me is most special because it invites introspection, reflection.

In that way it is an intimate holiday that begs us to do what we always should but seldom do: Pause the fast-forward that is our lives, and contemplate what matters most, who matters most.

Thanksgiving Day encourages the best of ourselves — because having gratitude and feeling thankful are fundamentals that nourish the soul.

There is a growing belief in sports psychology, too, that gratitude and a positive attitude enhance performance — that feeding one’s spirit translates to competition.

Beyond games, though, now more than ever, as divisiveness rips at our country, the idea of love and understanding has

never sounded cornier or more quaint ... or been needed more desperately.

Meandering in and out of sports and personal stuff, this is a Thanksgiving column that might get sentimental but without apology if it does.

Thanks first to my family, starting with my brilliant wife of almost 42 years, whom I would marry again and again, my two grown sons who make me laugh, my older brother and the daughter-in-law who gifted me my first grandchild, a now-4-yearold delight whose smile and laughter make me want to live forever.

Thanks for 50 years of Miami Herald readers, ever since a 16-year-old kid got a parttime clerk’s job in 1972 and made an unexpected career of it. To old friend Dan Le Batard for handing me a microphone and a national audience. And to our listeners who have my podcast on track for nearly 1 million downloads this year.

Thanks to old mentors like Edwin Pope and Bob Rubin, gone but fiercely remembered.

My first weeks as a Herald parttimer a football team in Miami was beginning what would come to be called the Perfect Season, the first and still the one and only. “Each year, as the last undefeated team loses, we come back to life,” says Larry Csonka, smiling. “It’s like the dust blows off and we’re up and we’re talking. I don’t know how to explain it other than to say it gives you the feeling, as you reach antiquity, that you’re still in there.”

Thank you, ‘72 Perfectos.

And to modern-day Dolphin Tua Tagovailoa, for continuing to believe in yourself even when the organization that drafted you didn’t seem to. Your grace under pressure the past three years speaks the world of you.

To Mario Cristobal, may you find that same inner strength Tua did as you fight to lift Hurricanes football to national prominence again.

The best school assignment I ever got was to interview the oldest person I knew. I interviewed my grandfather. I learned that as a 9-year-old who worked in a textile mill he testified before Congress in a hearing about childlabor laws. I believe there is a book hidden inside every person. Find the oldest person you know, and have a conversation about his or her childhood. Then say thank you.

I am grateful right now for the World Cup, not for where it is being held, but for the simply complex beauty of soccer, the majesty of the event, the unequaled passion it inspires around the world. (I know it’s asking a lot, but I’ll be extra grateful if the U.S. beats England on Friday.)

Thank you, Pat Riley, for making champions and a first-class organization of the Miami Heat across these past 25-plus years.

Respect to the empowering Miami Marlins for having the first major pro-sports franchise in

U.S. history with women both as president (Caroline O’Connor) and general manager (Kim Ng).

Appreciation for the Waddle dance, and the extra gear of speed Tyreek Hill flaunts. For athletic greatness wherever it plays. And for the nature of sports fans to believe, “There’s always next year!”

Thanks to all who espouse peace, love and understanding, because those are what hatred fears most.

Oh, and thanks to my dog Charlie’s uncontrollably wagging tail that shakes his whole behind, and that goofy grin every time he sees me, even when I’ve come back after only 10 minutes away. He can’t not do it. And I can’t not feel gladness — every doggone time.

For those reading, you are appreciated, and may the best of your world, like the best of mine, be a crowded table full of love on this holiday.

Happy Thanksgiving, all!