...because it was my birthday yesterday. (you say, “happy birthday” here.) Thank you. I spent it by going to work as usual, then crawling around under Preston’s truck, both of us covered in transmission fluid, until probably 11:00.
When I was in my thirties, I thought birthdays would start to depress me. Not so. As I approached 40, I thought, oh this is going to be the big one. Didn’t happen. 45 now, and still no existential crisis. I know other people who have had major emotional upheaval at those ages, but I haven’t had mine yet. I wonder why that is? The only thing that upset me was the one person who did not call me to wish me a happy birthday. You know who you are. And let me just say, I have never once forgotten YOUR birthday. Ever.
The truth is, I don’t feel 45. I still feel 20. I don’t even know what 45 is supposed to feel like. Carol says there’s no “supposed to”. And maybe she’s right. But she also says you don't get a year older until you eat a piece of birthday cake. And it has to be YOUR birthday cake, with your name on it. So this year I aged two years.
People are usually surprised to hear I have a 24-year-old son, and I know it’s not because I don’t look my age. I think it’s because I don’t act my age, whatever that means. Everybody I meet gets the real me, for better or for worse. I just don’t know any other way to be. I suspect I’ve lost a few customers at work because of that, but I know I’ve also kept some because of it so it’s ok. It all works out.
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