An Exercise in Gratitude
I recently purchased 100 thank you cards for a study I’m running for my dissertation. The study was funded by a grant, and as such, I have $5 to give out to participants. My original plan was to allow them to select from a couple options of $5 gift cards like Starbucks, because it seemed like getting a $5 card to Starbucks would be more substantial than just getting a check for $5. I mean, a check for $5 seems a little bit like more effort than it’s worth, whereas $5 at Starbucks is immediately spendable on some lovely caffeinated beverage. But I digress…
I bought 100 thank you cards because my plan was to mail the gift cards inside of them. However, due to some hoops I recently found out I’d have to ask participants to jump through to get these gift cards (i.e., mailing back a signed sheet saying they got the card — a lot of work for $5!), I realized it was much easier on them to just send electronic gift cards. This way, I can show my funders proof of transmission rather than having to put the burden of proof of receipt on the people who were kind enough to fill out my survey.
And that brings me to my present dilemma: what to do with all these cards? Knowing me, they’ll just sit around and collect dust until they’re purged in the next great transcontinental move my husband, dogs, and I decide to undertake (relatively soon). So I have decided, instead, to practice some daily gratitude and give out all 100 cards. I’d like to be really ambitious and say I’ll do it within the next 100 days, but that might impose a structure that would sort of artificially influence my gratitude. Instead, I will promise to document here, with stories and maybe sometimes even with pictures, each card as it is sent.
I’ve never actually kept a blog before, so we’ll see how this goes. Wish me luck!
