thirty-three

in recent years, if you’re friends with me, or even just an acquaintance, on your birthday i will invariably say i am so thankful you were born. then i’ll say something crude and we can move on from the emo moment. but, for the most part, i am thankful for births and the opportunity to celebrate them. it is a being, a presence that is noted in this world – in this universe, and should be done so with happiness and welcome. and the reaction i usually get when i say this phrase? i had one friend tell me that it made her cry when she received my note, and that it was the nicest thing she’d ever heard. priceless.

don’t get me wrong, there have been the blackest moments where i have wondered why i was born, wished that i hadn’t been born and i used to silently question challenge peter about my birth. i have grappled with the idea of my being here, of my fundamental purpose in being born, if i was meant to make a difference in Life, in my Life or in someone else’s Life.

today is my 33rd birthday. i have spent 32 years on this Earth, some chunks of time spent feeling lonely, isolated and invisible. but with that comes the equaling weight of having been loved & seen & heard. because you know what, i know i am a Being who is adored, who has loved deeply and supremely, that i have been gifted with people who know me, who want to know me. i have a certainty within me that i possess rare beauty, that my heart, a tattered punching bag most of the time, is a strong muscle, that my Life is an unchartered map, a space that is aching to be discovered and explored. i am sometimes shamed by my self-wallowing when i think of everything i have been given, and things i have achieved, usually forgotten when i’m on a pity bender. i must remember that wanting, desiring, NEEDING are ok, and that i must nurture my heart, that it needs tendering and care. i must stop burning down my Life with so much anger, regret and despair.

and so i start this day with myself, with a gentle and patient heart, filled to the brim with love and appreciation. i want this year, and the next, however many God gives me, years to be a remembrance of this notion.