Birthday Blasphemies

I'm happy to report that I turned another year older today. Despite good reasoning and gravity I remain alive.

And I'm in Hawai'i, with my kickass wife of 7 years.

Some might call that "Winning."  I might have to agree with them- it feels kind of incredible.  I mean, I feel older and a bit more crotchety and cynical (was that possible?) but damn.  I mean, damn.  There's a palm tree right outside our window- we are exactly 1 block from the North Shore- we eat fresh fruit everyday and pina coladas at night. We snorkeled yesterday and saw some of the most beautiful fish I have ever seen.  We were watching an OLD 'Friends' rerun, just as our dear friends Becca and Chris stopped by with their kid, Reeves.  We had a great time catching up and talking about the crazy present and future. Like Phoebe's hair.  Change is inevitable.


I am trying to avoid the obvious analogy to my life here. I mean, it's true that "Life is like a Pina Colada- the joy does not come in the morning."  or "Life is like a Pina Colada- you think it's gunna be awesome and then it IS awesome, and then you regret all of your decisions." or "Life is like a Pina Colada- WHY are you still drinking Pina Coladas?"

But why go with the conventional wisdom on this here 29th, no, 30th, uh... shit. 31st? day of my life.

Things I feel proud about:

1. Not being dead
2. Having a generally positive disposition of life
3. Being a pretty decent world traveler despite not having much money
4. Not having much money
5. Keeping our two spunky dogs alive for 7 years despite their best attempts at trying to off themselves
6. Running my own small business
7. Tutoring little monsters in reading and math
8. Reading the entire Lord of the Rings series. (yes it took me multiple years and I will use it under my list of accomplishments for multiple birthdays)
9. Having a small handful of lifelong friends
10. My dad. He made a humongous life change this year and I have been able to witness the joy and the pain of that
11. My wife. Everything she does just freaks me out.  She's that awesome.  I am SHOCKED, daily, with how obscenely lucky I am. Right now she is sitting beside me, drinking tea, playing a dumb game on her phone and she is being so awesome. Her hair is crazy beach tangled cool, her eyes are a little squinty cuz she just woke up, and she's wearing the most hideous pair of pants I have ever seen.  Man, I am so in love. Her brain is great- tons of super rad thoughts in there.  Her emotions are on fleek- passionate, adventurous, and not too concerned with whether or not I used "fleek" correctly. Her body is --- hey Nosey! Mind your own damn business! But seriously sexy though. I know for a fact that I couldn't possibly recommend my life to anyone without her being in it.  Sometimes I wonder what it would be like. The closest I get is imagining "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure" turning into "Bill and a Kinda Cool Thing That Happened."  Totally bogus.
12. My ability to number lists in order of unimportance and obscurity. Google is trying desperately to warn me that "unimportance" is not a word.  But it's my birthday, dammit!

Thank you for taking this time to read this.  Now here is a real photo of me at Hawaii.  You've earned it.