"You know you're getting old when you stoop to tie your shoes and wonder what else you can do while you're down there." ~ George BurnsI was trying to get through the anniversary of my birthday with as little fanfare as possible... then Judy spilled the beans on Facebook and floods of "happy birthdays" flowed in. So.. with much gratitude at such an outpouring of well wishes.. I say "Thank You!" You notice that I don't celebrate my birthday, but rather the anniversary of my birthday... my 30th birthday. I won't reveal what anniversary we are up to now, but let's just say that in a few, a very few years I will have to start celebrating the anniversary of the anniversary of my 30th birthday. Why 30th? Oh, I don't know.. it just seems like a nice round young number.
Laziness was the theme this year. I slept through half of it, but then my cousin David was on Skype the night before and we talked about everything for a very long time and it was almost time to get up before I finally went to bed and at my age, well.. you really need those eight hours of sleep. My brother called from Vienna, jet lagged from a 14 hour flight and with a cold from rabid fans in Japan. When Daisy and I finally dragged our ragged bodies down stairs I found two beautiful arrangements... one from my baby girl, Nyssa and one from my brother. Yellow roses and sunflowers to brighten the day from Stephen and an edible arrangement of the sweetest strawberries you have ever tasted in January, bananas dipped in white and milk chocolate, sweet red grapes and mellon balls. Oh, yes... flower shaped pineapple with melon ball centers as well and in such a cute teal green vase. I took pictures of the fruit and a good thing I did too... I ate them... all of them and they were great! The roses and sunflowers are still brightening the winter days... we had a bit of sun on Saturday but now clouds and rain are on the way for this evening. Still cold.
Mom decided to take Dad and I out to a fancy restaurant, The Vintage Tavern, for our birthday celebrations. You know it is a fancy restaurant when the first thing they do is exchange the perfectly good tan napkins for black napkins because you are wearing dark skirts or pants and you might get fuzz from the napkins on your clothes. It was an amazing meal... the menu is seasonal. So we had oyster stew, salad...watercress greens with fennel, sweet grapefruit centers, blood oranges and goat cheese with a creamy pomegranate dressing..broiled flounder over soft onion spoonbread with capers and cream sauce and sauteed mushrooms. At least, that is what I had. Dad had some of their gourmet mac 'n cheese as well and Mom had scallops, special cooked spinach and her scallops were over grits and with an orange puree that I think had carrot in it. We shared a creme brulee for desert. Mom paid the bill...she said this was Dad's birthday meal too, even though his will not be until February. We left the restaurant in what could only be described as somewhere between a waddle and a roll and I was still not hungry again well into Sunday afternoon.
So, thanks to all who helped make the "??" anniversary of my 30th birthday a raging success. At this age a success means you lived through it. Now, we continue... and another 12 months before we have to face it again.
"We've reached an age that when construction workers stare at us it's because they figure we might be considering a remodeling job." ~ Susan McClellan(end of post)

