Today you are you! That is truer than true! There is no one alive who is you-er than you! ~ Dr. Suess

Happy Birthday to Me!

I’ve always had a complicated relationship with my birthday, I imagine most people do. Usually that’s about aging, but that’s not the deal with me, the only birthday I had any issue with was my last one. Turing 60 got to me a little bit, felt like official old man age, although honestly, I don’t feel old. It was the only one though, not turning 50 when a friend reminded me I was closer to 100 than birth. Not even 40 when my mother sent me a dozen dead roses to my work. Honestly, growing up I didn’t think I’d see 30, tried to kill myself at 14. In my twenties I knew I wouldn’t see 40 as I had gone from being an alcoholic and addict to pretty much clinically depressed and that lasted until my early 40’s. Honestly, my last twenty years have been my best.

Growing up I don’t remember having a lot of great birthdays. I remember a couple of half-assed parties, a weekend where a couple of friends stayed over at our cabin, but honestly no really fond memories. Too much parental alcohol, broken promises and at times, too little money. As I got older I tried to rectify this, when I turned 40 I decided to celebrate for the whole year and I did a damn good job, that was my first Burning Man adventure and the burn happens around my birthday every year. My best birthdays happened at and around Burning Man. Had some good ones in Tennessee, two good people there, one shares my same birthday, the other only a few days shy. We had some great celebrations together eating good food with good company.

But all in all my birthdays haven’t been great, usually celebrated alone and on the present front, well as my mother just told me, she doesn’t know me well enough to get me a present without me telling her what it is supposed to be. The crowning event of my birthdays of course is that the love of my life married another man, you guessed it, on my birthday. So a complicated relationship with the day of my birth.

This year is a significant one, a little over three months post open heart surgery, feels like a new beginning, have even considered changing my birthday to May 7th. But, as the Minister of Happiness, it’s an obligation to find ways to be happy, hell, that’s an obligation as a human as far as I’m concerned. So, while I’ll be starting my birthday in the morning by having my annual work evaluation first thing, I’m determined to make it a good day, and a good birthday.

So tonight, I baked my first ever cake, pictured above. I’m not a baker but even so, couldn’t help but tweak a mix, added some cinnamon and vanilla to the batter, very good decision. The cake is quite tasty! Tomorrow morning, after my evaluation I’m coming home to make an early lunch, bacon wrapped hot dogs and a coke, go for a walk. After leaving work at 7 tomorrow night coming home to a meatloaf I made tonight, for meatloaf, noodles and gravy a little trip back to my childhood, cake for dessert of course. Then I’m taking Thursday and Friday off to make it a five day weekend. While I wish I was on the Playa, 50 mile an hour winds, rainstorm and all, Burning Man is not on the agenda. But this weekend I’ll do a few last things on my San Francisco checklist, I need to go to the Palace of Fine Arts and the European Art Museum and then finally, yes, really, I need to take my first cable car ride. And of course, some good food and decent pizza.

So a quiet but good birthday hopefully, hope you’re having an equally good time my friends, happy birthday to me. ~ Rev Kane