It's my 25
th birthday today...I know I haven't announced its advent like in
years past, but besides it being a turbulent time, website uptime reliability has been nonexistent. Then, after lauralore.com was moved to a data center, the data center caught on fire. My inbox has ceased it's flooded state of emails screaming that the site is down...I suppose y'all have realized that it would more closely relate to "news" if you told me my website was up, running, and error free.
"Y'all." Hmph. Thought I had eradicated every bit of Southern from my person.
And, of course, no birthday will ever compare to my
last. I've been grateful to my recovery the last weeks, as I know the overwhelming fatigue has stayed the pangs of reminiscence, of longing. "Do you feel 25?" they ask...I am forced to reply that I do not, indeed. I feel much older...sluggish...tired...and oh so weary. I worry that my eyes have lost their brightness some days.
They tell me, "Oh, once you finish healing...!" and they just don't understand...the hyperaging has been raging for a very long time. A very dear friend wrote to me in an email just yesterday, on the subject of finding people who truly understand you , "I think both you and I probably went from puberty to our mid-thirties straight away..."
Thus far, my twenties have been saturated with illness and death, marriage and divorce...and happiness...overwhelmingly, with happiness. I am awed that life can be so rife with joy after so much pain, through so much pain, in spite of so much pain and perhaps because of so much pain. I've caught myself groaning that I hope better tidings for the next 25 years, but when I surmise of just what that means, I am uncertain. How could life improve for a person who is able to love so freely, embrace so uninhibitedly, and smile so easily?
I've retained the parts of myself worth keeping in the last years. I had dinner with Debbie and Brenda last night...Debbie asked for my menu of choice and unabatedly I replied, "Seafood Alfredo, steamed asparagus, fresh-sliced tomato...and homemade apple pie." And it was worth every morsel. This morning, Nick caressed my ears with the birthday song just as we woke, pampered me with gifts, and had me smiling from ear to ear...no simple feat for a girl who dreads the start of the day so wholly.
I'm still the luckiest person I know...I have friends in this life and the next, and I am well-protected in their affection. The last 25 have been difficult...the next 25 will be difficult...and the love will continue to cascade about.
Self? Happy Birthday.
