The unadorned truth is... I turned 40 years old in October. What was true at 30 is still true at 40- I am pretty much the youngest in crowd we hang out with, so reaching a milestone has the feeling of catching up rather than cresting the infamous hill. Milestone birthdays call for extra celebrations, so here is how my big number has been honored.
1. The day before my birthday I was informed by a certain offspring that when I wake up in the morning I will be an
old lady. I think I missed the transformation. Truth be told, sometimes I feel old, sometimes I feel young... so I'm glad to have that little matter clarified.
2. This old lady woke up to find it raining and deemed it the perfect day to sit around binding a quilt that has been on my to-do list for several months. My dear husband went to some inconvenience to purchase a Cricut machine for me, and picked up some chocolate truffles for A. to give. My family escorted me to Olive Garden for a lovely evening off from kitchen duty and a delicious meal of Chicken Riggottoni, without getting them to do that noisy song & dance routine.
3. The weekend following my birthday, my parents came for our school benefit auction. My dad, bless his heart, planned the menu and brought the food for Friday evening- pizza, wings, a special kind of chips from my hometown, and a Dairy Queen ice cream cake. Me 'n' DQ cakes go back a long way. I had actually gone into the local DQ to buy myself a cake, thinking I wouldn't get one otherwise, only to find their stock at the moment was primarily ghastly-looking halloween designs, so I walked out empty-handed.
4. The Tuesday after my birthday the Miller ladies took me out to eat. We went to a little one-of-a-kind restaurant for lunch; it must be one of the last places in the USA that serves reasonable-sized entrees to where us small people actually have room for dessert. Yea for hot fudge sundaes! Afterwards I tagged along with them to do some shopping, which is always an experience. (Between being thrifty and not having had sisters to share the experience with, I just never aquired the skill of shopping like they have. I am not a snappy dress-er so I shop for sweaters like a man and I'm totally clueless about "trying on" purses!)
Not that it has anything to do with my birthday, but I spent that evening tramping through the woods helping JS blood trail a deer he shot. This time we had a successful recovery. His first doe harvest with bow. Who would have guessed that I would cheerfully do these things at 40?!
5. This past weekend was a party with my circle of close girlfriends. Being the last of the group to turn 40, I knew we would do a slumber party of some sort. I was told in advance when to be ready and what to bring but not where we were going. I'm usually a minimalist when packing but it takes extra stuff when the details are vague.
Here's where the real story starts: I was blindfolded and helped into a vehicle. I discovered my sense of direction is better than I expected- I was accurate in my assessment of where I was a fair portion of the time, but my sense of trust needs some polishing. I realized I have grown so used to being the 2nd set of eyes for my teen drivers that it felt uncomfortable to sit back and trust someone else completely.
During our meandering along the scenic route- an unfamiliar dirt road, which had the desired result of confusing me about where I was, I felt the first twinges of carsickness. Eventually we got on an interstate; I reoriented to our location and the smooth sailing eased the carsickness. When we exited interstate, I thought we were headed to a certain cabin, but then we turned the opposite direction. All the stop & go of town driving brought the carsickness back with a vengence. My fine escorts told me to remove the blindfold, but I knew doing so would ruin the surprise. I was just stubborn enough to try tough it out. I was concentrating on not throwing up so I didn't give any more thought to where we were. Upon arrival at our destination and removing the blindfold, I discovered I was also dizzy. So dizzy that it took several long seconds for me to recognize my friend's house. No, I wasn't one bit disappointed with the location- I was just trying hard not to throw up! I'm told I was quite "green" when I exited the vehicle. Hey, it makes a hilarous story to blog about!
What followed was a lovely night of Subway subs, salted caramel mocha latte cake, scrapbooking, Enchanted April discussions, cuddling the baby, being brought up to speed on all the finer traits of modern cloth diapering [lol], fire in the fireplace, tea & hot chocolate, dark chocolate, blessings and gifts. Ah, my friends know me well!! Maybe if they keep giving me colorful scarves and other trendy clothes -combined with A's fashion sense- maybe, just maybe, some day I will actually be able to step out in style. We can always hope! [
Disclaimer: That was not a bid for more gifts. It is a compliment to my classy friends. Time will tell if the adage is true "you get like the people you are around". Like I said, I can always hope.]
We stayed up till 3AM -quite a feat for "old" ladies like us. And finished off with Bob Evans for breakfast.
I've asked if that is it...if there's nothing else I can look forward to. My philosophy is half the fun of something is looking forward to it. There are a few friends in more distant places with whom I was hoping to catch up. Hillcrest alumni, anyone? So far no dice. Trying to decide if my expectations are too high or if I should continue to live expectantly. At what point should one feel celebrated enough? Oh well, we have a 20th anniversary coming up in a few weeks that I can look forward to celebrating! :) [
Disclaimer #2 I am not complaining. It's more about when does one let their guard down? I so hate being shocked, being robbed of the joy of looking forward to things. If anyone has a secret to let me in on, you know where to reach me. haha]
