We often cannot choose our circumstances, but we can always choose our attitude. I was reminded of this maxim recently as I sat down to eat at The Coffee Shop, a small breakfast and lunch restaurant in Marathon, (pronounced Mer-thon) Texas, population 450. The place looked like something out of a 1950 movie set: an old corner building with a few tables outside and a few more inside. A couple of local men in cowboy hats mingling inside and a few visitors to the area having their breakfast outside. As it turns out a lot of people come from all over the world to visit Marathon, a town in the middle of nowhere in west Texas. The vastness and the “lost-in-time” feel of the area attract people who want to experience the grandeur of the American West. Francine waited on me and had a notebook filled with names of people…