Birthday

I remember the day my birthday no longer felt like my birthday.

When it was just a regular day and not my own

The reality that my aging was not some sort of spectacle but a reminder that I had rooted myself into this life by choice or not. My birthday at one point transitioned from excitement to nervousness, as my brain decided what to do with it. The responsibility of acknowledging that on this day years ago I came into an existence. Birthdays should really be about your mother I mean she did all the work, her gift from God to me and eventually someone else.

So now here I am 28 years later, I feel like I can write again for the first time in weeks

A reminder of how lucky I am to be alive will do that to you

I lay in bed the stillness of the morning comforting me as a book presses on my chest, listening to the soft breathing of my lover beside me

More than a love, my partner, my mirror of life who’s leg drapes over mine as proof that I’m no longer going at life alone.

I am blessed and happy and faithful

And lucky

I’m lucky to be alive and in this timeline, one where I write and share. I have plans that would surprise even me as a little girl

Dreams vivid and daring but tame enough that I can grasp them.

My father once told me he uses his birthday to reflect. I can see him lounging on the loveseat in his room staring out the big open window.

I myself woke up this morning and sat on my balcony

Because I have a freaking balcony?!

And I thought of nothing.

I watched the train go by and the birds chase eachother around the sun

I felt the coldness of the morning air against the outside of my arms

And I thanked God

Because this was peace, I thanked him for every birthday I had before and reminisced on each one.

I am thankful my life is so beautiful, that right here right now is going to be one of the highlights of my life where everything is seemingly going right

I don’t long for anyone else’s vessel but my own. The journey I have is the one I want

And there were so many to choose from

I think that’s the catalyst of change, I think the reason I get so much peace right now is because 28 is going to bring a lot of change

Change that I don’t fear, good change, happy change, change that takes courage, change that whispers to me how great the glory is on the other side of the experience

So today, I lay still, and I celebrate how great it is to have 10 fingers and 10 toes. I  don’t wrestle in the fear of the unknown but I embrace the idea of all 27 versions of me preparing me for 28. Right now is real, and one day it’ll be so far away it’ll be hard to prove that . But for now it’s mine, and that’s something to be happy about.