The stump makes an old shade visible through its absence.

Some things get measured only once they are gone. Nobody notices the shade of a tree while standing in it, and then the summer after it comes down the heat, the light, the missing birds and the changed sound of the garden describe exactly what was there. Absence is a precise instrument. It reports the size of what you had been given for free.

Think of something currently making your days easier that you have stopped seeing: a person, a routine, a piece of quiet. Name it while it is still here, and say the thanks now.