You know that little blank box on the left hand side of our Facebook profiles? The one no one can quite figure out what they should write in? One profile I saw today read in the box: “I have nothing but gratitude for every single stupid second of my little life.”

I thought it was pretty remarkable since often we get too wrapped up in our lives to truly be grateful for what we have. And I thought of this most last week when during my daily news-gathering I stumbled upon this piece about the DABA girls. If you haven’t read it yet, stop and go read it, and then come back here.

It’s called Dating A Banker, Anonymous. The DABA girls are a bunch of twentysomething women, mostly in Manhattan, who are dating rich bankers and basically living the life. That is, until every bank in America started imploding and the credit crisis hit –and every financial professional’s life got a lot more stressful.

Their girlfriends, however, are having none of it — and they’re absolutely despondent over the fact that they might not have their monthly Bergdorf’s allowances, they might have to cook dinner themselves, they might not get bottle service anymore, and some of their credit cards are getting cancelled. On their blog, they share their stories. One even complains that she may have to move to the Midwest for a more affordable lifestyle (and what is so wrong with the Midwest, I have to ask?)

Yes, I have heard some speculation that the DABA girls thing may be a stunt. Whether it is a stunt or not, I have no idea. But either way, the girls are either a) telling the truth, and genuinely unhappy about their lavish lifestyles being taken away, or b) really, really hungry for publicity. Either way, totally out of touch with reality.

The DABA girls, to me, are representative of a larger problem in society: we’ve forgotten where we came from. Gratitude is now only in style once a year, on Thanksgiving. All of us are guilty at times of taking what we have for granted (although the DABA girls take that to a whole new level). We get obsessed with wanting more — which is, after all, the American way.

The best part about the NPR article I linked to above is when the NYT, in their statement, says:

“The reason we liked the story — likely the same reason it has attracted so much attention — is that we knew it was resonant with many people who had nothing to do with their group but found themselves in similar situations.”

Um, what? I know a lot of people that are affected by the recession. But, when you’re worrying about making ends meet or finding a job or funding your company, who can actually relate to these girls?

No one living in the real world, that’s who.

They don’t give us something to relate to. They just give us a picture of how an abundance of wealth can make you completely lose your mind, and just how destructive money can sometimes be when we let it run our lives. Because the more we have, the more we want, until we completely forget where we came from. Instead of appreciating the little things, we start to just expect them. And demand them. And we become the centers of our own universes instead of remembering the things that matter.

But at the very least, reading their story reminded me of one thing: I have a lot of things to be grateful for in my life, recession or not. Exactly a month ago, I was sitting in Cambodia in an orphanage while little kids ran around our table trying to sell us books. Five years old, and they work all day hoping to sell a book or two because if they don’t — there wouldn’t be dinner tonight.

I don’t even know what I was doing when I was five. But I think my biggest worries in life were whether I could get my bedtime extended and whether I was going to get Polly pocket for Christmas, and probably how soon I was getting the training wheels off my bike. Yeah.

Being grateful is sometimes hard, but we shouldn’t let anything make us forget how fortunate we still are. Sometimes, all it takes is that little reality check.

Nisha Chittal is a writer and journalist who currently serves as Associate Editor of CitizenJanePolitics.com and is a political columnist for UniversityChic.com. Her personal blog is Politicoholic, where she offers commentary on a range of topics, including but not limited to politics, technology, and the changing role of women and Generation Y in politics today.