I was born September 18, 1967. Birthdays have always serve as a marker to the passage of time for me.
Last year on my birthday my heart hurt (a little bit) from the loneliness of starting over in a new city. Moving to the South some days felt like being transplanted to a foreign country. Some people sometimes spoke with accents so heavy I couldn’t understand them. The South is a place where when someone says, “Oh bless your heart” it isn’t actually a nice thing, which left this traveler evaluating exactly what was meant to be nice.
Last year on my birthday my foot was slowly recovering from a stress fracture that occurred during the height of the big move to Tennessee. I was 2 months into a cough that plagued me for 5 months. All these little mini crises had knocked me off my exercise program, which in and of itself caused a whole new crisis.
But a year has passed. Another move into a more permanent home has transpired. My foot has healed. A twenty one day course of heavy antibiotics finally kicked that dreaded cough. I now occasionally run into familiar faces at the grocery store, I also find friendly faces among the crowd at my regular stomping grounds and have dragged myself kicking and screaming back to the gym. (Eventually my body will remember that I enjoy exercise, right!?)
Life has an ebb and flow. Seasons filled with laughter combined with dry spells. This border, the anniversary of my birth, reminds me that every year is uniquely filled with opportunity, wonder and people. Birthdays remind me to slow down so that the days don’t shift through my hands like sand, but instead to evaluate each passing hour for the gift that it is.
On this birthday I can look back to the monuments of God’s goodness, the things that make me smile, or roll with laughter, and the memories that still remind me that life is short.
Happy birthday to me, but more importantly thank you for being part of my world.
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