President's Message

The run up to Thanksgiving each year always seems to strike a wistful note. Something about seeking gratitude for what we have today has us looking back on what we have lost and what we have endured. It can also focus our eyes ahead on what we want but cannot have. Gratitude is a serious thing. 

It is no wonder then, that for some, Thanksgiving is painful or at least …complicated. While we give thanks for what we have, for the people in our lives, for the strength or knowledge we gained through hard fights and hard work means that we must feel the loss of loved ones or the embarrassing sting of failures all over again. 

As the inimitable Darrell Scott sings: 

It’s the Day Before Thanksgiving, I’m not feeling much of thanks.
Just a low-grade desperation leaves me reeling in the ranks. 
Just when I think I'm getting somewhere it's somewhere further to fall.
It's the day before Thanksgiving. That is all.

Thanksgiving is stuffed with opportunity and hope. The opportunity to take stock of ourselves and consider all the good in our lives. That opportunity leads to hope. The expectation of a better tomorrow not in spite of today, but because of today — and yesterday — and all the good days, the bad days, and the worst days that led up to today.

This Thursday, as I sit alone with my three young children at the table, eating an untraditional meal, and grieving 2020, I will sing to myself another Darrell Scott song:

I walk a crooked road to get where I am going.
To get where I am going I must walk a crooked road.
And only when I'm looking back I see the straight and narrow.
I see the straight and narrow when I walk a crooked road.

And while I give sincere thanks that my crooked road led me to the League and my dream job, I will also give thanks for how this pandemic will have prepared us in some way for a future beyond our imagination.

Thankfully yours, 
Bruce

P.S. Clearly, I like Darrell Scott’s music. Give him a listen.