forty seven

Happy birthday to me! And hello to all (both?) of you. It's been a while.

Today, December 3, is my birthday. I am forty seven years old today.

There is a full moon in Gemini tonight, a supermoon, and Mercury is in retrograde. I'm not gonna lie, that all freaks me out. But I mean, I can't not leave my house, right? Gotta live my life.

This morning over coffee in bed, my husband asked me, "Do you feel any different?" Someone asks me that every year. Usually, the answer is, not really. I feel pretty much the same.

This year, everything feels different. I feel every single moment of my age. I feel every experience, every joy, every heartbreak I've endured, every damn ounce of it.

This has been a hard year for a lot of you. It has for me, too. And a December birthday tends to make one feel...reflective. Christmas music everywhere. I'm emotional, man. I tear up a lot. I walk around wanting to hug everyone. I hugged my broker a couple of days ago. I think he took it pretty well, considering.

My mother and I went out to dinner at one of our favorite restaurants a couple of nights ago to celebrate our birthdays (hers is tomorrow). Cabernet and filet mignon for the birthday girls! When we presented our credit cards, our waiter gently pushed them back towards us. Someone has taken care of it, she said. Naturally, we wanted to know whom we could thank. But we were told that the person wished to remain anonymous.

Many of you have had to endure my heightened sentimentality of late. You know how every now and then, something sad or poignant will happen, and we will be reminded "Don't wait to tell the people you love that you love them?" I've been doing a lot of that. And if I have told you that, know that it's because it's true, and I didn't want to wait another minute to tell you. I need you to know that you're important to me, in case you ever wonder, or in case you're hurting and awake at 3:30 in the morning feeling hopeless because everything is up in flames and just need to remember that at least I love you, or in case one of us is hit by a truck anytime soon.

I know. I'm not cool.

And I know I'm not young anymore. I'm not interested in being young, staying young, doing insane shit to myself in order to look young or seem young. I don't want to lie about my age or anything else. I like maturity. I think it looks pretty good on me. I'm interested not in clinging to my last forty years, but in looking ahead to my next forty. This year for me has been about shedding everything that doesn't matter, stripping it away so that all that's left is the important stuff. I'm trying to make room for whatever's next to enter. I'm waiting. It hasn't gotten here yet.

My baby girl isn't a baby anymore, and the clock is ticking. She will soon leave my protection and enter this big, scary world to fight her battles. If you asked me what I see myself doing in five years, I wouldn't be able to tell you and that scares me. I worry a lot about our country and the people running it and think, we need better people running this thing.

But it's been a good birthday. Sweet. Full of friends and family and a little time writing on the back deck. Soon my husband and the WP will go and meet my mom for a quiet, early dinner. I have it on good authority that cupcakes will be involved, but I think I'm supposed to act surprised.

I'm ready for what's next. Ready or not, here it comes.

I haven't done this in a while. Here's a playlist.