To the Editor: As we approach Thanksgiving, I am reminded of something my Mom said one year. She said, “We never had a turkey at Thanksgiving,” and then she chuckled and smiled and said, “We had a chicken!” A chicken. One. For five family members. But Mom never mentioned that. Mom was more than abundantly blessed with the gift of gratitude. Raised during the Great Depression, she often expressed her thanks to the bank that held the mortgage over the family home. Instead of requiring borrowers to pay the full mortgage of interest and principal, they developed a policy whereby...