Happy Birthday to Me!

So, it’s my birthday today. It’s not a particularly special one this year. It doesn’t end with a 0 or a 5. It doesn’t even end with a 9. It is a prime number, though, which is kind of cool. I’m 47 today. I guess you could say that it’s not a special birthday. But to me, every birthday is a special birthday.

Some people don’t like to celebrate birthdays, because they remind them that time is passing. But I like birthdays, because they remind me of how many wonderful things can happen within a single year!! I like to look back on all the wonderful things that happened to me in the past year. And I like to look forward to the wonderful things that are yet to be in the 365 days ahead of me.

Birthdays are special to me because they remind me of my childhood. My mom threw my sister and me amazing birthday parties. I remember being in my garage with a line of lit candles at one end and a line of kids with squirt guns at the other, racing to see who could put their candle out first. I remember a living room filled with multicolored spider webs of string, one color for each guest, and we had to follow our own, untangling as we went, to find a goody bag at the end. I remember birthday cakes shaped like trains, and ladybugs, and numbers. I remember laughter and joy and feeling loved.

As an adult, though, I find birthdays special because of the gifts. No, not the kind that come wrapped in pretty paper and topped with a shiny bow. I love the gift of seeing literally dozens of birthday wishes from family and friends all over the world waiting for me when I get up in the morning. I love the gift of having my children bounce happily onto my bed in the morning, squealing, “Happy birthday, Mama!” I love the gift of the look of intense concentration on my son’s face as he solemnly delivers me my morning coffee in bed. I love his whispered confidences of what he and Daddy picked out for my birthday present (“But don’t tell Daddy you know, because it’s a surprise!”). I love that my husband loves to pamper me on my birthday, that he knows all the things I love but would never splurge on for myself. I love that in his eyes I will always look as young as I did on my first birthday that we celebrated together.

I am a year older today. Another year of my life is past; I am another year closer to the end of my life. But that’s not a bad thing. I have used the last year well. I have laughed and loved and lived. I have spent time with my children and my husband and my family and my friends. I have tried to help others, and I have tried to make the world a better place. I have learned to be more loving and more patient than I was a year ago. I have given to those in need and loved the loveless. I have become closer to God. I have said “no” when I needed to and “yes” when I wanted to. I have seen a bit more of the world than I had a year ago. I have lost loved ones and learned to remember their lives with joy instead of remembering their deaths with sorrow. I am, as they say, sadder but wiser.

Last year was, as most years are, a year that saw both joy and sorrow. Through the pain I have become both stronger and more compassionate; through the joy I have received peace and wisdom. I am not who I was a year ago, and I am not yet who I will be a year from now.

I am simply me, looking back at the past and ahead to the future. And I am happy with them both. And if that doesn’t make a birthday special, I don’t know what does.

Happy birthday to me!

The Holiday Birthday Dilemma

My husband’s birthday is the day after Christmas. My stepdaughter’s birthday is Independence Day. My birthday is sandwiched between my son’s birthday and Thanksgiving. The only person in our immediate family without a birthday slap up against some other celebration is my daughter, with her ha-ha-there-are-no-holidays-in-August birthday. We all have a few wrinkles due to the proximity of “our” special day to some other special day. My husband gets presents wrapped in Christmas paper. I haven’t had a birthday cake of my own in years, just a candle stuck into a piece of pumpkin pie or a rocket-shaped cake shared with my son. My stepdaughter gets a cookout for her birthday dinner every year whether she wants it or not (although the fireworks display is a nice consolation). It kind of stinks to have a birthday close to a major holiday.

But it also stinks for those of us trying to celebrate a loved one’s birthday that’s near a holiday. I struggle to find a free evening to take my husband out for a nice birthday dinner among all the other family gatherings and church services and holiday parties. I wrestle with the idea of baking a birthday cake, the leftovers of which will just sit on the counter amidst the 5 different kinds of Christmas cookies and the 6 different kinds of candy that overflowed the stockings, tempting me to commit caloric sins beyond belief. But the hardest part of all is buying him presents.

First of all, in stereotypical husband fashion, whenever he wants something, he buys it for himself. To be fair, he’s no worse about it at Christmas/birthday time than he is the rest of the year. But he’s not the type who thinks of something he’d like in September or October and says, “Hey, I don’t need this right now, I’ll just put it on my gift list.” Nope, he goes straight to amazon.com and CLICK! He doesn’t need it any more.

Second, he’s a techno-geek, so the majority of stuff on his gift list is a) expensive, or b) completely incomprehensible. B) is not a problem unless the item is sold out or back-ordered on Amazon so I have to go to a brick-and-mortar store and try to find an overworked, undertrained, and underpaid temporary holiday employee to help me find the same item. If his birthday were in May or October, I bet everything on his gift list would be in stock. But looking for it on December 18^th, along with everyone else in the known universe who waited till the last minute to do their holiday shopping, and you’re just out of luck.

And third, you have to get a whole bunch of gifts all at the same time. Since I have two young children, I have to get him gifts from them as well as from me, so (kids + me) x (birthday + Christmas) = 4 presents. Plus my sister and grandmother want gift suggestions, and I can’t just tell them “Get him X” – I have to tell them, “You could get him X, Y, or Z.” So 3 suggestions x 2 family members = 6 more ideas. Now we’re up to 10 things!! And all within a reasonable price range! It’s a good thing I have a small family.

My husband, God bless his cotton socks, doesn’t make a fuss about having his birthday close to Christmas. Whenever I ask him if he wants a separate birthday party and family Christmas gathering, he shrugs it off. The birthday cake he asks for every year is a gingerbread man – carrying a big Christmas candy cane. 

I’ve never heard him complain on the rare occasion he does get a birthday gift wrapped in Christmas paper. And when he hears me plotzing about what to get him, he tells me not to worry about it. But I do worry about it, because birthdays are special. You only get one once every year. And I want his to be special. Because HE is special.

But if I can’t quite manage to make his birthday as special as I’d like it to be, I’d say that the next best thing it to treat him as if every day were his special day. After all, he is special to me, every day.

Photo A Day, Day 17: 5 O'Clock

It just so happens that today is not only Day 17 of the November Photo-A-Day project, but it is also my birthday. I began my birthday celebration last Wednesday, when my dear friend Amy treated me to a wonderful dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, and presented me with a fabulous birthday cocktail glass; it continued yesterday afternoon as my husband took me shopping for a dress for formal night on our upcoming cruise vacation and then to another wonderful dinner at another of my favorite restaurants; and it went on throughout the day today as my husband brought me coffee and an English muffin (my favorite breakfast) in bed, got the entire church to sing me “Happy Birthday” at coffee hour, presented me with a handmade present from my children, then made me the official “Birthday Girl” cocktail from the recipe on my new cocktail glass, IN my new cocktail glass, and is now making me a delicious dinner of pork chops.

 

So at 5 o’clock, I am happily watching my two beloved children romp and play while I am sipping a delicious cocktail and smelling the aromas of a dinner which I am not cooking wafting down from the kitchen, thanks to my fabulous husband.

I don’t mean to get overly maudlin, but it is amazing to me what has happened to my life in the past few years. Seven years ago, on my 38^th birthday, I looked at an invitation to my 20^th high school reunion and realized that I was not where I had intended to be at this point, and I decided to take charge of my life. I joined match.com and within a year, I had met the man who would become the love of my life, my dear husband, and the father of my children. Within 7 months of meeting him, I married him; within a year and a half of that we had a wonderful son and within with two years of that we had a beautiful daughter. And now, two years after that, one of my dearest friends is someone I met because HER son is best buds with MY son; I spend my days playing with and teaching and loving my two children; I have a grown stepdaughter of whom I couldn’t be prouder; and I have a husband whom I love more than my own life. And I am a happy, alive, and vibrant 45 years old today.

Given all that, what else would I be doing at 5 o’clock other than making a toast? To Life!

Piece of Cake

When I was a little girl, I always looked forward to my birthday. Of course, I loved getting birthday presents, and I loved that it was the one time every year that I got to choose the whole dinner menu (and even omit vegetables without being scolded). But what I loved most of all was the cake. When I was older, the good part about the cake was that I got to choose the flavor, but when I was small, the exciting part of the cake was that my mom would make it in the shape of something. One year it was a choo-choo train with Oreo wheels. One year it was a caterpillar with miniature candy-cane antennae. A bright red ladybug with licorice spots. A teddy bear with a gumdrop nose. Some years it was the shape of the number of my age decorated with my favorite candies.

But it was always something more special than a cake-shaped cake, and it was always something that I loved. And it was usually a surprise.

I promised myself as a child that when I had children, I would do the same for them for as long as they enjoyed it. Little did I know that by the time I had children of my own, extravagant cake decorating would be a huge trend and elaborate fondant-trimmed cakes created by a bakery (or a much more artistic and talented mom than I) would be the norm.

So when I sat down to make my own children’s cakes, I was intimidated for a moment that my creations would not be as spectacular as these. But you know what? I knew that my kids wouldn’t care. Like me, their cakes will be special to them not because they are works of art, but because they will know that their mom spent time choosing, baking, and decorating something special just for them. 

 

And if I raise my kids so that knowing that someone did something special for them makes them happy, then I’m doing something right with this parenting thing. And that’s so much more important than baking the perfect cake.

You Say It's Your Birthday

Today is my birthday. I am now 44 years old. A nice, symmetrical number. Half a lifetime ago, I was 22. Another lifetime from now, I’ll be 88 (God willin’ and the crick don’t rise). I spent my 44^th birthday with my grandmother, my sister, my husband, and my kids. For presents, I got earrings and a CD.

The way we celebrate birthdays changes through the years. When you’re age 1 or 2, there’s cake and balloons and your immediate family and that’s kind of fun but you don’t really get the significance of it. Once you hit age 3, you’ve very aware that the day is all about you and that there will be cake and presents and balloons. At age 6 or so, the party changes from family to school friends and the presents are really all that matters to you. Once you hit age 13, birthdays become not about the presents but all about the money that comes inside the birthday cards. That lasts until about age 21, when you start getting mostly dull, practical presents like clothes and stuff for your apartment, and the most exciting thing about your birthday is going drinking with your friends.

And then you turn 30 and birthdays begin to remind you that time is passing. And it’s passing faster and faster every year. You have enough of the basics that the presents turn from practical to fun again – instead of the sweater you got from your girlfriend and the lamp you got from your folks when you were 23, you get concert tickets from your wife and a night of free babysitting from your mom. And the fun stuff kind of makes up for the rapidly advancing numbers on the calendar.

And then you hit 40 and maybe you’re not so excited about birthdays. Eh, it’s just another day on the calendar. Nothing to be upset about, but nothing to make a big deal about, either. It’s much more fun celebrating your kids’ birthdays. Or, if you’re fortunate enough to have living parents and grandparents, celebrating their birthdays and the fact that you ARE fortunate that they’re still around to celebrate birthdays.

And it stays this way until you’re 70 or so. And at that point, birthdays become something to celebrate and be excited about again, because you are aware that each one is a gift, and that you never know which one will be your last. And because birthdays are a reason for your kids and your grandkids to come and visit. The cake is nice, and the presents are nice, but the family is really what makes your birthday happy at that point.

So half a lifetime ago, I probably had a party with my parents and my sister at my folks’ house, and maybe I went out to dinner with some friends, and I likely got presents like a slipcover for my couch and a bag of potting soil for my window boxes. And a lifetime from now, I’ll probably have a party with my children and my grandchildren in the private dining room at Shady Pines and my presents will be things like the good brand of denture cream and a box of designer Depends.

But I’m glad to know that I’m in the very happy middle right now, where I can enjoy spending time with the generation ahead of me and the generation coming up behind me, and that the presents I get are purely for my enjoyment, and that time is passing but that there’s still lots of time left that hopefully I will use as successfully as I’ve used the time gone by. In the words of Dr. Pangloss, this is the best of all possible worlds.

Happy birthday to me!

 

You Say It's Your Birthday

Today is my birthday. Two weeks ago, it was Ryan’s birthday. In the past week, two of my friends have had babies. At my last job, I worked in a group with about 20 people and five of us had birthdays in November. November is a wonderful month to be born in! And after carefully counting on my fingers, I’m thinking that Valentine’s Day might just have something to do with it. But I digress…

Birthdays! They’re something that Americans celebrate with great gusto. On your birthday, not only do your friends and family give you presents and good wishes and balloons and cake, but complete strangers do nice things for you. Restaurants offer you a discount, a free meal, or a special dessert. When I was in college, a few friends and I spirited my roommate off to NYC for the night and took her to dinner at a Chinese place. We pulled our waiter aside to let him know it was her birthday, and before we knew it, the entire waitstaff came back with a giant orange taper candle stuck into a scoop of lichee ice cream on a plate, rang a gong, and announced, “Happee burfu-day, An-na!”

I was once in line at the registry to renew my license and during a conversation I struck up with the woman in line behind me, mentioned that my license expired TODAY and immediately half the people in line turned to me and wished me happy birthday.

It’s kind of funny, when you think about it. What are people honoring you for? Being born? It’s not like you had all that much to do with the event. It would make more sense to honor your mom on the day you were born – after all, she did most of the work. You just kind of went along for the ride.

Or maybe they’re honoring you for surviving another year. Congratulations – you managed to go for another 365 days without being hit by a bus, or catching typhoid, or falling off a cliff. Have some cake! Nope, that doesn’t make sense either.

I guess it’s just nice to be recognized for making a contribution to the world, even if the contribution is nothing more than existing. So what have I done in the past year that was a contribution to the universe? I’ve raised a wonderful little boy who’s brought sunshine into many lives. I’ve tried to make my husband’s life happier. I’ve joined in celebrating the anticipated birth of my cousin’s baby and the anticipated wedding of my sister, and I’ve celebrated the actual birth and wedding. I’ve performed on stage and hopefully helped to bring some smiles to people. I’ve supported charities and causes that help those in need. I’ve smiled at tired-looking cashiers, waved harried drivers into a line of traffic ahead of me, and offered a seat to a stranger in church. I’ve laughed and I’ve loved and I’ve tried to give others reason to do the same.

Yeah, I guess I’ve done enough this year to not feel guilty about all the good wishes that people are sending my way. So thanks to you all, and happy birthday to me! Let’s see if I can make this year even more worthy than the last.