EMILY: "Does anyone ever realize life while they live it...every, every minute?"
STAGE MANAGER: "No. Saints and poets maybe...they do some."
Thornton Wilder, Our Town 
That quote is from one of the great, maybe the greatest, work of American theater. Our Town is a portrait of life in a small New Hampshire town in the early 20th century, and it is also a broader, deeper look at common joys and simplicities that we all too often take for granted. Except, perhaps, on the fourth Thursday of every November.
Like most Americans, the CommonPlaces crew will take this Thursday to spend time with our families and loved ones. We will pause to reflect on the great, good fortune which blesses our lives every day, and we will eat pie. We'll laugh, we'll delight in familiar scents and flavors, and we'll recognize that another year has passed. We may even ask ourselves why we don't spend more time recognizing these simple pleasures.
We work in a fascinating industry, doing things which would have been unimaginable not too many years ago. There are few things more satisfying than being able to say that your job is cool. Our gorgeous new office is filled with gifted individuals who work together as a team '- except when we engage in Nerf dart battles. We have fantastic, interesting clients, and really love the daily challenges which make getting out bed and coming to work so worthwhile.
In short, we have so much to be thankful for. Here are some of our thoughts for 2013.
Ben Bassi (Company CEO): I am thankful for the fantastic team we have now at CommonPlaces. I am also happy that their commute is so much shorter now that we're in Manchester, even though my own commute now is a real pain.
Michael Reich (VP of Operations): I'm thankful for my beautiful daughter, healthy son, smokin' hot wife, and being able to walk again. I'm also thankful for keywords. And did I mention "buyer personas", "inbound marketing", and "web marketing"?
Carolyn Bowers (Marketing Strategist): I am thankful for my amazing husband and every day I get to spend with him, my unique and loving family, and the joy I feel every day when I walk in the door and my cats come running to greet me.
Gary Locke (Content Editor): I'm thankful that my parents gifted me with a sense of humor, which gets me through every day. I am also grateful that my wife laughs with me every day, and not always at me.
Bryan Campbell (Web Developer): I am thankful that I am back in New Hampshire because I am now able to once again live very close to my family.
Mike Machnik (Senior Web Developer): I'm thankful for bacon.
Kendra Bassi (Project Manager): I am grateful for books. And Goodreads. And my book club. And wine.
Stanley Tremblay (Social Media Marketer): I'm thankful for acts of goodwill towards man. I'm also thankful for great food, a table to hold it, and friends and family to surround it. And beer. Or whiskey. Ya.
Illustration by Norman Rockwell for
The Saturday Evening Post