Love actually is... all around

I think I have finally figured out why I love birthdays so much.

A birthday is permission to celebrate someone, permission to be "cheesy" and sentimental, and tell someone "you're fabulous, and I love you".

For the second year in a row, I am absolutely flabbergasted by the wonderful sentiments people have expressed to me on my birthday.

People's kind words, generous hugs and big smiles have completely overwhelmed me, in a GREAT way!

I have documented every year about how the period of time leading up to my birthday is always a time of melancholy for me - where I evaluate what I have accomplished to date, and what I had expected myself to accomplish - and I always fall short. It makes me sad to get another year older because I feel so far behind.

But what I have been awakened to this year is - to have the love of the people in my life, and to be able to express how much we value each other: that is the greatest gift in life.

It's been under my nose in the Bible my whole life, but my full appreciation for it hit today:

"If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. If I speak God's Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, "Jump," and it jumps, but I don't love, I'm nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love. "

1 Corinthians 13:1-5


Thanks for loving me.

All you need is Love.....

Today is my birthday.

Normally that brings about very mixed emotions from me. I love and hate it at the same time. I am usually very concerned about having some type of celebration, and I usually also make a pretty huge stink about counting down for weeks leading up to it. Mostly this is because I have a real thing about being forgotten. I have had several experiences in my history when I have been forgotten by people - physically forgotten, stranded. And it has created in me a genuine subconscious, ever-present fear of being forgotten.

So I spends weeks, sometimes even more then a month counting down to my birthday, planning a party or parties, etc... to ensure that I am not forgotten, and am celebrated. (sounds kinda narcissistic when I put it down on paper like this)

I also tend to get pretty depressed around my birthday. I have blogged about this before. I start to examine and evaluate my life, and always come up short on my own expectations.

This year has been different. I am not sure what elicited the change. I considered having a birthday party, but everyone's schedules (my own included) are so packed this time of year, it felt like I might be able to get something going in April! And I didn't really do the countdown. I haven't been secretive or hiding the date or anything, just wasn't a walking billboard for weeks.

And while I have stumbled into thought pockets of "what do I have to show for myself" they have been fewer then usual, and I have had some good metaphorical face slapping from good friends to snap me out if it quickly.

And most amazingly of all, without any prompting from me, people have been celebrating with me, and sending me their good wishes. And it feels so much more powerful this year, because it wasn't elicited.

I feel genuinely loved (or positively esteemed), by an entire slew of people. It is awesome!

And it's all in the little things. The colleagues who treated me to lunch today; the serenade of Happy Birthday I got when I came into the office; the cake Danielle made me (in my favourite colour) & having SWAT sing for me; the well wishes on my wall on Facebook; the text messages and phone calls; being called "birthday girl" all day (even when the whole sentence was "the birthday girl needs to get her ass in gear"); Steve's admonition of (and well wishes on) being one year closer to death.

It is all wonderful! and I think my face might actually be sore tomorrow form just how much smiling I am doing today, and how happy I feel.

I feel like the grinch when his heart grew.

THANK YOU!!

I have grown wiser in the past 24 hours

So my Birthday has officially passed, I was born 29 years and more than 24 hours ago.
And while waking up on Saturday (my actual birthday) didn't feel any different than waking up on Friday - well except for the giant wrapped box at the foot of my bed - I think I have eased into the wisdom that comes with age ;)

I had an all-party week-end (a party on Friday, one on Saturday and one on Sunday)- and it was awesome, I loved it.
It definietly reinforced just how social a being I am. When I do the Myers-Briggs inventory, I score like a 98 out of 100 in the extroversion scale (it's a continuum from introversion to extroversion, and the idea is that everybody is a blend of both, and can't be completely one or the other, but has elements of both). Well not me. I am a full flegged bonified people person.

It's not even that I hate doing nothing, I would just rather do nothing with someone else.
Have to clean my room - if you're there with me, I would gladly participate. Both Saturday and Sunday night after each respective party (I had 2 birthday parties), one of my guests stayed a little later than the others and helped me clean-up. Techincally on Saturday 2 guests stayed back while I saw some others out, and by the time I got back upstairs there was hardly anything left for me to do (Thank you Austin and Nina). And you know what, I actually really enjoyed cleaning up, 'cause I had someone to do it with.

I realize that it's true about my running as well - if I have someone to do it with, the time passes more quickly and it's so much more enjoyable. Probably why the running room works so well for me.

And while I always knew that I was a people person, I guess I never put the pieces together as to how much. And now I am going to decide to embrace that about myself instead of thinking I need to mellow out a little. Now I know how to set myself up to succeed at something new - make sure it involves people, and I'm good.

So last night as I was getting ready for bed, as tired as I was after an all-party week-end, I feel asleep with a smile on my face. After all what better week-end could I have - 3 days of fun times, with fun people that I like to spend time with, and I got to wear a tiara!