Today is my 33rd birthday.
When we’re young, birthdays are pure joy, just this awesome thing one earns for becoming more of a “big kid.” When one gets a bit older one realizes that a birthday is a celebration of a day that someday won’t come around again. There’s no guarantee we’ll make it back to the anniversary of our birth, and each time we’re a little older and in a completely different place in our lives.
I don’t mean to sound morbid here. I am profoundly happy and grateful that I am alive. Though I’m writing this before the day is through (really barely only started) I am fairly certain I’ll be able to look back on this birthday as one of the high points in my life. The celebration began late Thursday with a wonderful visit with Mz Honey J and Grace — it was a pleasure to spend time with them both but also delightful to watch their own budding relationship, one of those fun side benefits to polyamory. Then my Pet arrived from Houston for a stay through the weekend.
Tomorrow there will be drinks and music with friends. Then on Saturday is Eeyore’s Birthday, an event for me that marks the start of my favorite parts of the year, the freak’s festival season that leads up to Burning Flipside and beyond into the summer.
But it’s not really about the actual events of those days so much as the place I find myself in. During the last year I have gained so much love, grown so much closer to my community and family of choice, and, very slowly but measurably, I have begun to eke out a living using my words. I’m in the city I love most and surrounded by more people I love every day.
Life has its ups and downs and it’s important to recognize, and celebrate, the good times.
Thanks (you know who you are).
