Irene Soléa

Happy Birthday

Today is my birthday! I wasn’t especially looking forward to it, but I wasn’t especially not looking forward to it either, it just felt like not a big deal this year. That said, allow me to tell you about just how great my friends and family are, why they have convinced me that I and my birthday are so important, and what I think you should all do about it:

• I was surprised by Renée, Kevin, and Mike last night with sunflowers, candles, wine, mangoes, sweet words, and great company. Ahhh what a way to bring in the only day that is all about me
• I was sung to by the awesome ladies of Libana! I want to be them in thirty years!
• I heard from friends that I would have assumed thought I was dead by now…and they were so nice…they didn’t make me feel guilty at all!
• I got phone calls from three different countries!
• I get to break my healthy diet and pig out on Peruvian food at the one and only Machu Picchu restaurant. Actually, ceviche hardly counts as pigging out, but I highly recommend it. Raw seafood marinated in citrus juice with tasty spices.
• My mom wrote me the sweetest little letter saying all the perfect things that greeting cards say but this time in her very own words
• My brother is driving into the city from his summer beach getaway just to celebrate my existence

So, I start out not making a big deal of it, but the people around me know better. Birthdays may not be about hoopla, but damnit, it feels good to celebrate yourself. And I’m realizing that there is actually some stuff to celebrate: I feel so much more comfortable in my own skin, I’m doing a little less striving and a bit more being, I’m relaxing a bit more with the unknowns, I’m being more gentle with my neuroses, and overall it feels pretty good. So, don’t knock it, but just try it:

This year, for your birthday, instead of just receiving nice cards from others, give yourself a nice card from yourself. Come on…do it! Actually have the balls to sit down, think about why you are cool, what has made you proud over the last year, why your existence in this world is a special thing, and just write it down. Feel free to do it in advance of your birthday, so that you have something to read on your special day, and then revel in the fact that you can celebrate yourself. I don’t think enough of us can, or do, so throw a little modesty to the wind.