Thanks a Thousand: A Gratitude Journey (TED Books)

by A.J. Jacobs

When I ponder the number of gratitude recipients involved, I start to get dizzy. There are the folks at the paper factory where the cardboard is made. The lumberjacks who cut down the trees for the wood pulp to make the cardboard. The metalworkers who manufacture the chainsaws the lumberjacks use. The miners who dig up the iron that is turned into the steel for the chainsaws. It’s like a particularly vicious series of pop-up ads. Every time I identify another step, I’m confronted with hundreds of divergent paths. I could write a thousand books, depending on what corridors I venture down. I remind myself: Don’t forget the folks who make the hardhats that the miners wear when getting the iron that’s turned into steel to make the chainsaws the lumberjacks use to cut down the trees to get the wood pulp to make the cup that my coffee comes in.