36 Happens

Hey you guys - um.. guess what? Did you know you can't stay 35 forever? Ok, well, I knew it too. Just testing you.

So hey, the last year has gone so fast.. hasn't it? Is it true that as you get older, time goes by faster? Or do you just forget that time actually passed?

Anyway.. HI! I was born THIS DAY! Let's focus on that! MY BIRTHDAY! YAY!

And over the course of this year.. I've learned stuff, right? I think I have.. so let's recap maybe.

* Last fall, Boz, my last ex, and I weren't even friends. Now we are. Pretty decent ones, actually. Not for lack of effort, that's for sure. But we chat, have fun together, celebrate birthdays. I like it. I think that's improvement.

* Jump to this last spring when a close girlfriend emailed me and told me we couldn't be friends anymore for reasons still unknown to me.. and in about 10 minutes, I learned how to instantly stop caring for someone I dearly loved.

* I took a trip to Black Rock City, Nevada for Burning Man with my good friend, Pixie. Something I really wasn't sure I'd ever do in my life, but she inspired me, tolerated me, made me feel a bit brave and a lot more proud of myself for camping an entire week in a dusty lake bed. It opened my eyes to new things and new people and gave us an experience that bonded us closer. I love that we'll always have that.

* There are actually times I don't interrupt people when they're talking - my customers, my friends.. I know! It's crazy! And shockingly, I'm not sure anyone has noticed.

* Unbelievably, other than the second point, and I let that go the moment I knew it was gone, there's been little to no drama this entire year. In fact, I know of some drama I was indirectly involved in and I actually stayed out of it! Yup, I know. You can pick your mouths up from off the floor now.

* In addition to not interrupting as much, I listen better, I'm more positive, I feel stronger and sometimes even smarter. I kick ass at Scrabble these days.

* I made two major purchases last year that made me so happy: My Mac that I LOOOOOVE and has consequently caused much more computer-addiction, but that's ok. I'm a COMMUNICATOR! It was necessary. Also, there was a shocking wake up call and a sad goodbye to the severely destroyed Focus due to last year's winter storm in December but that only led to the purchase of my current beauty, my shiny and zoom zoomy Mazda 3 that I love love love. We call her Miss Daisy because I drive her. She rocks.

* I'm not a lot closer with my family than I used to be, but it's better and it's so nice to see them so much happier these last years than they have been. Or maybe it's the way we're treating each other. I think we're all becoming friends and it's a nice transition.

* I'm a lot more comfortable with myself these days - with my goofiness, my body, my emotional capacity. I'm more myself now than I was last year - than any year before - calmer in some ways, happier in others. I accept not everyone will take to liking me, loving me, having any affinity for me whatsoever a lot more readily than I used to. Hey.. I'm not everyone's cup of tea.. and that's really ok. That kind of popularity's a bitch.

* I watched my niece, Lulu, turn 1 and start to look more like her mother every day as she demolished her birthday cake and wiped it all over her party dress. She walks now and last time I saw her, she walked right over to me and motioned for me to pick her up and sit her in my lap. My heart grows two sizes every time she smiles at me.

* I feel blessed. I have great friends, a great new roommate and a happy home, a job that isn't sucking the life out of me and in which I may be promoted in a month, enough affection to keep me smiling and secure and feeling a sense of being cared for.

* Also this morning, Miss Shine got up before me, which was unusual, I got in the shower and when I came out, there was a bouquet of daisies on the table and four big mylar balloons - three stars and a bigger silver one that says 'Happy Birthday' waiting for me. Um.. also also, there maybe even were Cinnabon cinnamon rolls in the oven! FOR ME! THEN she served one up, all toasty warm with a candle in it and sang me her family's special birthday song! Aren't you frickin jealous?! You still can't have her, in case you forgot. I think she might be one of the best birthday gifts this year.

I've lived this year. A lot more ups than downs, which I think depends on how you look at it all. This was a pretty good year. Mostly, I remember smiling a lot.

So I'll officially be 36 at 10:58pm tonight and will raise a plastic glass filled with something alcoholic just before Spin The Bottle starts, where my friends and I will be tonight, and I'll wish myself another good year that doesn't fall in my lap, but rather that I make happen. I did it this year. I consciously asked the universe to provide happiness and strength, but I made a deal that if the opportunities were presented, good or bad, I would roll with either and make lemonade out of the lemons, find the silver lining in the dark clouds.. or any other cliché as long as the universe worked with me and not against me. Course it could've just been that my perspective changed a little too.

That's right people.. it's called growth. Whoo hoo! I'll take another year of that please!