In recent years I’ve emailed Thanksgiving thoughts to friends as well as past, present and hoped-for future Excel customers. The following Thanksgiving thoughts are excerpted from a column I wrote for the Marin Newspointer in 1993.

My stroke rehabbing mother's pedometer was still short of a thousand steps for the day, so I parked the truck at the Tam High parking lot and we walked. We walked to the tennis courts before she needed to sit. Then I asked her to walk to the basketball courts behind the tennis courts, which her splayed eye and stroke-impaired sight could not yet see. I had a feeling about being closer to what I was watching behind the mesh tennis court fence. At mid-court, she asked to sit on the stool I carry for her.

Sitting, Ma could see the Black Labrador gnawing on a ball. She saw the basketball player shooting baskets at both ends of the court. She could even tell the shooter shot from a wheelchair. She couldn't see the shooter's leg, so I told her.

After watching her many times wheel and dribble the length of the court, stop her chair on a quarter, shot and score, I asked her, "What happened to your foot?"

"A bike accident."

"Bike accident?" I asked, thinking I hadn’t heard right. "You fell from your bike?"

"I was riding my bike back from the Biking Nationals in Utah. Race was over. I was just going home. It was a hit and run."

"Driver didn't see you?"

"I don't know. It was a four-lane highway. Two lanes each way. All I know is driver was a she and she kept going."

"How long ago?"

"Two years."

"This part of your therapy?"

"Yes. But it's also practice. I was just selected to the national team. I'm on the Meteorites. Next week we have four games in two days at the National Tournament at Mills College."

"Well, that's great."

"I really didn't think I'd take to basketball but it came to me rather quickly. "

"Have you gone through depressed periods."

"For six months they wouldn't let me move. The other leg was broken and both my shoulders were broken, so they didn't want me to move at all. I couldn't handle that. To me I was ready to go."

"You were depressed because they wouldn't let you work out?"

"Yeah. I'd always been athletic. And they didn't want me to do anything."

"Now you do this, and you do it well. Did the therapist feel comfortable with you competing in basketball?"

"No. Not at all. They don't want me doing this."

"Do you bump a lot in the games?"

"Oh, Yeah. It's a contact sport all right."

"Do you bundle your leg well?"

"Yes, but you still hit it."

"And can you get around on your own. I mean can you cook and get around the house?"

"Yes. But that's a depressing part, to know that you have to hop into the kitchen and climb down the stairs one at a time. That’s depressing... But I just started basketball. I used to swim on the Master's at Stanford until they put this on and said I couldn't swim anymore."

The "this" ringed her left leg like the "halos" that sit on heads of spinal injured people. Long screws went through the top ring and a thick, bulky rap covered the rest of what was left of that leg.

"When they cut the leg off they left only three milliliters beneath the knee. They’re using this to stretch it. They broke the 3 milliliters of bone that was left after the operation. Attached a bone from my stomach and when it grows to 11 milliliters they can put a prosthesis on it. Then I'll be able to run again."

"Could I see it?"

"Sure,” she said, as she lifted the bulky rap, showing the red, swollen, amputation with blocks of skin jutting out, marking corners to the stump. Below the knee and wrapping was another ring with another set of screws connected by the shaft and stretching it away from the top ring.

"How long will it take?"

"They said two years. But they also said it would take 9 months to get to where it is now, after 6 months."

Getting cold, Mom said, "We'd better get going." So after a throw of the soggy, lifeless tennis ball that Toby had found on the baseball field, we began to leave.

"Is he a trained guide dog?" Mom asked.

"He’s been Canine trained but not guide dog trained. I raised him as a pup and then gave him to the Canine society. I gave him up, and he became an aide to an elderly lady. She died and they asked me if I wanted him back. They retrained him to open doors and things like that, and now he's back helping me. Toby's 8 and a swell companion."

"It was nice meeting you," Mom said, as we walked away and she returned to practicing.

As we turned the corner on the tennis courts Mom added, "And I complain about my situation."

All my Excel business earnings go into non-profit, do-good endeavors. This year I used those Excel revenues to help pay for part of the privilege of working with eleven other Americans and many wonderful Sri Lankans to build two Habitat for Humanity homes for two lovely families near Pollonaruwa, Sri Lanka. A before clay-mud house and after house shot is enclosed. If your ISP can’t see the pictures and you want to see them, let me know and I may put them on my under construction personal web site. You might also consider switching to a better ISP like Excelonline. (www.excel.com) .

Thank you. May much fill your life with Thanksgiving.