1. … to be alive and healthy.
2. … to have a best friend.
3. … for the generosity of strangers who donate their time for free culture projects. I use so many free tools every day (e.g. I manage this blog with free software), I won’t attempt to list them.
4. … for museums and libraries and other local institutions that bring the best of culture to us.
5. … to have clean food and water.

I’ve put off writing this post because I wanted to say something eloquent about Sita Sings the Blues, a free-culture movie masterpiece. I couldn’t muster eloquent, so I’ll make due.

Roger Ebert first turned me on to Sita. Sita is a modern take on the Ramayana on the feminist side with vocals by Annette Hanshaw. (I’m a sucker for cross-cultural mashups.) I like it. My girls like it. My youngest regularly requests the “Hindu god movie”.

So go watch it. It’s free!