My Birthday, I

Here I am, officially going to blog again.

Today is July 22, 2010 – the day after my birthday. I turned twenty-three yesterday, and it was quite possibly the most love-saturated birthday I’ve had as of yet. And it’s not even over! This afternoon, I’m hanging out with Jaime (and she’d better buy me a birthday hard lemonade); tonight I’m going on a birthday date with Mom; and later I’m going to see “Inception” with Tony. Tomorrow, I’m having another party – this time at Senor Taco – with friends who weren’t able to make it to Barley’s last night; Saturday, I’m having a birthday lunch with Rachele, and in the evening I’m having a family birthday party at my parents’ house. And THEN, it’ll probably all be over. Twenty-three will no longer be exciting. Unless it’s the number of birthday cards I get in the mail over the next two months.

But nobody sends birthday cards anymore. ::siiiiigh::

At any rate. I feel like tumbling head-over-heels down a rabbit hole somewhere.. all the love that’s just been LAVished on me over the past couple of days.. it’s just been next to unbearable. But not really.

I went into work yesterday and stretched my body out into a capital “X” in front of my boss and coworkers, and said, “Guess what today is!!”  Eventually my boss remembered, and looked worried. Work went on, and I bounced around for several hours.. I’m sure my aura was bubblegum pink or daisy yellow.. then Josh[y] and I took a smoke break and when I came back inside, there was a massive chocolate cake on my desk – with a cigarette in the center, sandwiched between four chocolate-covered strawberries. After lighting and blowing it out (and taking a drag or six), I all but ate up my boss and Josh. Those men.. if they ever die, I’m so making shrines for them. In my bathroom. (What??.. )

ANyway! Then I came out HERe (I’m at Java in the Old City) and got my free birthday hazelnut latte and talked to Mr. Tice Tansil next door at his flower and jewelry store (Boldure). For my birthday, he gave me a compilation he made of wise quotes from children’s books. He gathered, printed, and bound the book all by himself, and it definitely made me almost pee myself. It’s absolutely incredible, and so “me!” I don’t think I’ve ever received a present so perfect.. ::siiiigh::

All OVER this day (up and down, side to side, all around, inside out), people have been bLOWing UP my phone with birthday ballads and texts, and I probably received about three hundred (or more..) birthday blessings from Facebook friends. Sheez. What is up…?

So then I went down to Barley’s, and over the course of the evening, I got to spend QUALITY time (my “love language” in a hard core way) with Corinne, Jessica (Corinne’s cousin), Ryan (Jessica’s boyfriend from Northern Ireland), John (Tomato Head), Dave (one day old Daddy), Tony, Forrest, Andy, Lauren, Rebecca, and if I’m forgetting anybody, I will kill myself later.

It was great. Tony bought me and himself tickets to see “A Prairie Home Companion” when it comes to Knoxville in September!!! Corinne got me a pair of earrings that E’ERyone was complimenting me on all night long, and some home made Toll house cookies – of which I only got to consume two. They were so delish.

Wow, I’ve been talking about my birthday a lot. Well, it was a GREAT DAY! Of COurse I’m going to talk about it a lot! I haven’t had a birthday this awesome in three years. My last awesome birthday, I turned nineteen. That was a great birthday, that I remember. After that… well, I won’t go into that. At any rate, it’s been the best birthday ever. I was thinking about it yesterday (which was my birthday, by the way), and….. I wonder.. I’m wondering.. why it seems to be that we’re all so impressionable. Allow me to expound.

The past three birthdays that I’ve had (twenty, twenty-one, and twenty-two), long story short: were stunted by the presence of insecurity. My energy (important to say: not “me”) was speaking to the world around me that I was fearful. Fear-motivated people are dangerous, whether they realize or not. I think people, over those three years, grew to realize that I was not a safe person to be around.. because of the voice of the “spirit of timidity” or the fing demon called Insecurity hovering over my soul twenty-four seven.

What I’m finding.. so interesting these days, is the ridiculous entropic cycle here. Who knows which comes first, the chicken or the egg, the fear, or the rejection.. but when I was in it (when I’m in it), the fear itself, of somehow “becoming evil” penetrates my motor functions, and I act like the thing I fear most, wHiCH, in turn causes the people around me to move away; to judge; to criticize; and reject. Which feeeeeeeeeds the fear, and the behavior.

And.. I forget where exactly I was going with that. But it’s enough for now. I’m going to go pick Jaime up from the Boys & Girls Club. She’s not my daughter, by the way. She’s a tattooed, pierced, and hippied-out Fourth-and-Giller, who works at the Boys and Girls Club in Vestal. And she’s awesome. The end.