Thanksgiving is a time to reflect and remember the many things we have to be thankful for each year. Yes, even this year.
The amber glow of incandescent lights warmed the wall at which I gazed as I sat to write this piece. I’ve got Mary Lou Williams playing in the background – jazz is something I only listen to this time of year. – but I can’t think of a better accompaniment than her music as I try to create an ambiance; try to set the mood.
I was thinking earlier this month about when exactly I started writing this editorial. This is the fourth year it’s been published here at Battery Power, but I’ve been writing it since sometime around 2002 as a nod to the long-time Atlanta sports writer and editor Furman Bisher whose Thanksgiving Day column was a must-read for generations.
Thanksgiving, that magical holiday of casseroles and extended family, brings with it the anticipation of the holiday season and the new year there after.
But first, the here-and-now and just-was.
As I have done in years prior, if you’d like to soundtrack this article, here is one of my favorite songs of the year Magdalena Bay “Image” which you can watch/listen to on YouTube. Or if you want something a little more melancholy, Kacey Musgraves “Deeper Well” might be a better option. Or, you can check out the new song by TV On The Radio’s lead singer Tunde Adebimpe called “Magnetic” which is quite good.
Fall is my season. Maybe it is yours, too. Each year I look forward to it more-and-more. I try to soak in each cool breeze, every tree whose leaves canvas the horizon and then the ground with a pallet of colors, warm and cheerful. I try to make time to listen to the sound of the leaves, first as the breeze passes through them as they dry on the branches and then as they meander their way from sky to ground on the way to giving crunch-filled ASMR as feet, big and small, frolic on nature’s blanket.
But most of all, Fall is the time when I try to be thankful.
When I was younger, I took so much for granted. Did you do that, too? Back then, there was always a next time or the carelessness that comes with unfettered, unaware youthful proclivities.
Now I try to be mindful and thankful of each day – whether it is the fourth Thursday in November or not. Like most everything else in life, it is a balance. You can’t spend your whole life reflecting on it. You have to live life, too.
As is tradition for me – and in recent years, here – I want to take time to be thankful with all of you on the Atlanta Braves, this year and life itself.
Photo by Todd Kirkland/MLB Photos via Getty Images
Here’s to another year of being thankful. Even this year, the side-eye worthy 2024.
October and November were hot and dry and that saved on the power bill. I’m thankful for that, even if I’d like to have seen frost come several weeks before it did.
I’m thankful for the times when I can make someone laugh – even when they don’t want to – and I’ll act the fool to do so.
I’m thankful for Chris Sale and his magical season. Cy Young? Good for him, it was long over due, but something I don’t think anyone thought was realistic nine months ago. I’m not sure a starting pitcher had more of a surprising season with Atlanta after coming over in a trade since maybe Russ Ortiz.
I’m thankful for those two weeks before the end of the regular season when the Braves clawed their way into the playoffs.
I’m thankful for positive surprises, on the field, or off.
Campy, old school wrestling matches that follow the basic formula of bad guy “boo” and good guy “hooray” are fun more times than they aren’t. I’m thankful for that.
I wrote a letter to Santa this year. It’s the first one I’d ever written. You’re never too old to believe. If you think you are, you aren’t.
I’m thankful for rizz.
I’m thankful for skibiti.
But I’m sure glad I’m not skibilit toilet phenom tax rizz. Or maybe I am and I’m too old to realize it.
I’m thankful for kids who believe in you almost as much as you believe in them.
It was a good year in music, something that I’m always thankful for.
Enjoy what you enjoy and you don’t need to apologize for that. Chappell Roan, here’s to you.
Among those artist with new albums that have come out this year that I’ve been able to enjoy, thankfully, are Fontaines D.C., André 3000, Suki Waterhouse, Momma, The Cure, Kendrick Lamar, Magdalena Bay, Dehd, Father John Misty, Kacey Musgraves, DIIV, and many, many more.
Every year I am thankful for cornbread made from stone-ground corn and cooked in cast iron, the only way it should ever be cooked. Don’t you dare put sugar in my cornbread, or we will have words.
I haven’t had near-enough homemade biscuits this year. My waistline is thankful for that but I, personally, am not.
The fall foliage made up for a slow start with an epic marathon – the last couple of weeks of the season really amped up with yellows and oranges seeming more rampant this season. Good job to all the various gums, I noticed you finally decided to show-up and show-out with your reds and purples.
Here’s to the hickory trees who did a lot of the work late and for the maples who are always the belle of the ball. It has been way too long since I’ve had hickory nut cookies, though.
I am thankful for Gio Urshela and Whit Merrifield for keeping the Braves afloat down the stretch. There are no odds too long for the chance of that sentence being written any time by anyone ever, until September of this year.
It was a tough season for most to the regulars in Atlanta’s lineup, as we all know. That makes one appreciate Matt Olson and Marcell Ozuna just a little bit more since they both played in all 162.
I’m beginning to worry we may not see 155+ games from both Ozzie Albies and Ronald Acuña, Jr. in the same season again – at least not with Atlanta.
I’m thankful back-handed grounders, fielded cleanly, and outfielders making snowcone catches.
I’m thankful for reinvention.
I’m thankful for perseverance.
I’m thankful when I order a sandwich and get both a top and bottom bun. Don’t laugh, I failed to get both earlier this week.
I’m thankful for not having hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia. I do have to make an effort to do better about using 50 cents words when I write, however.
I don’t like too many sunny days nor too many cloudy days in a row. Balance, don’t you know.
I still enjoy my coffee. But I’m thankful when I make a cup and it tastes extra delicious. Well, as delicious as coffee can actual taste. That seems to happen less these days. I think it is me and not the cheap coffee of which I partake.
I’m thankful for value. I’m more thankful for quality. Both seem to be in short supply.
I’m thankful to the grinders.
Speaking of grinders, I’m thankful for freshly ground black pepper. And Confidence Man.
I’m thankful that I can be thankful for the small things in life. I feel bad for those who can’t.
I’m thankful for the historic events the grand old game had this season.
The 2024 Braves season was probably the most frustrating in at least a decade, based on expectations. With each passing year, the concern that the window for championship contention is closing gets stronger. It is hard not to wonder when the word “rebuild” starts to enter the lexicon of prognostication in Atlanta’s baseball universe.
Thankfully, we aren’t there just yet. Otherwise, I would take myself by the collar and become a defenestration practitioner.
I’m thankful that the changes made the the Braves television broadcast team in the last couple of years have been a net positive.
I still enjoy listening to baseball on the radio, even if I don’t do it very often.
I love pies.
Like, I really love pies.
These days it seems hard to just flat-out enjoy anything. Everything is bad for you or makes other people upset or gets gobbled-up by venture capital or gets over-analyzed to the point that the soul seems sucked out of many things.
I prefer the designated hitter rule in the National League but I miss pitchers hitting.
I’m glad MLB lessened the infield shift and instituted the pitch clock.
Can MLB do something about adding cameras that are on each foul line and foul pole? For all the discourse about the automated strike zone, the flight of the ball over first or third and over foul pole shouldn’t be a mystery.
While we are at it, can teams push back seating or put in railings or netting to prevent fans from interfering on balls-in-play?
I digress.
Thank you to Jesse Chavez and Travis d’Arnaud and to Max Fried and A.J. Minter. I hope we some of you back here again next season.
I hope Michael Harris II can stay healthy and take a big leap forward next year.
I hope the team can stay healthy in 2025.
I hope we can all stay healthy in 2025.
I’m thankful for so many things this year. I’m thankful that the journey has continued for all of us. I hope if you have struggled this year or if you are struggling today, things get better for you. If you need help, I hope you ask for it and I hope you receive it and that it helps.
I’m thankful today.
I’m thankful for another year of sharing part of it with you. Thank you for taking the time to read Battery Power today and every day.
Thank you to family. Thank you to friends.
I’m grateful and thankful that we are able to enjoy an era of baseball with the Atlanta Braves that provides us hope and distraction for most of the year.
Today, I hope your food tasted better; the company you kept was as enjoyable as it has ever been; and that you were blessed with joyfulness.
Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.
Selah.
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