45 minutes and counting.

Can you believe it grandma? Can you believe one of your grand-children lived to be thirty?! That must be overwhelming. I tried to imagine being my grandma today, being a grandma and living to see my grand-daughter's 30th birthday... but deciding it improbably, i retired that thought from my brain. You know, my mother, on her 30th birthday, found out she was pregnant, with me. Strange. And impossible. That won't happen to me, I can guarantee it.

I will not live their lives, I will live my own.

Not really much choice in the matter.

43 minutes.

My birthday party was Friday night. Amelia and Michelle threw it because they pretty much rock and they love me and were probably tired of seeing me mope around the house (that was before I had decided to embrace being thirty).


They threw me a hawaiian themed party with fruit and grass skirts and lei's and they even put the Hawaiian words for things up around the house and even on the dog. It was awesome.



I bought a cute dress for the party at Parts and Labor, one of my sister's favorite stores on South Congress. I couldn't resist.



It was perfect! Plus I was too paranoid to actually wear a grass skirt and coconuts...

The party itself was uncharacteristically small with quite the variety of people, but it was good and people seemed to enjoy themselves.





I was SO tired from the long day I'd had (acupuncture, shopping, eye doctor, waxing studio, yard work, house work, laundry...) that at 1:30am I feel into bed on my new sheets given to me by Joy and Angie. They were so soft and for the first time in a long time, I slept like a baby.

I also got a water gun, $2, and a crazy hat as gifts for my birthday.



An exciting part of the evening was when friends clamored that they wanted to see the hukilau dance. I and two other women had learned the dance in grade school. In three different states mind you (Missouri, Arkansas and Texas) we each learned virtually the same dance and miracle of all miracles, we remembered it. Mostly. And my fearless friends video-taped it. Yes, I'm on Youtube. Don't say I never accomplished anything in my life. I made it on TV... sort of.



And yes, by that point in the evening I had become chilled and decided to put on my mother's old pair of grey sweatpants with my christmas socks on underneith my dress. I don't think you can see the socks in the video.

So yeah, it was a good party.

23 minutes.

18 minutes.

Are you waiting like I am? Counting down the minutes, sitting in your living room wrapped in a blanket on the couch, lighted only by the glow of the open computer?

My youngest sister called and marveled at my age. Of course, I suppose I marvel at hers as well. When I left home she was in middle school. In my dreams, when I sleep, she's never older than eleven. Strange. Now she's 23.

16 minutes.

Shit. I don't have anything profound or enlightening or even interesting to say. Surely something should happen or will happen. (Something other than the hail storm that blew in and broke my kitchen window). Someone should fall in love or get kissed or something. A winning lottery ticket (although I didn't buy one). A banking error in my favor.

Something.

In the room the women go
Talking of Michaelangelo

I may measure my life in coffee spoons, but my life matters. It matters.

My coffee spoons mean something to me. My life is special, delicate and I measure it carefully, meticulously, so much so, you may call me crazy, but it's my life. My life. And it's the only one I've got.

So I laugh and I cry and I overanalyze.

And you will love me just the same.

3 minutes.

Just the same, just the same.

"It's my birthday," she said quietly in the dark room.