My Birthday Weekend: Or I'm 43 . . . Seriously?

Um  . . . I am 43 now. I barely remember turning 40. I must have turned 40 at some point, but I only know this because I wrote an entire series on it. Apparently, I also turned 41 and 42, considering that's how biology works. But now I am 43, and I don't look a day over 42 and a half if I say so myself.

"I don't feel like I'm in my forties, do you?" a friend of mine asked me the other day. "I feel like I'm still in my thirties."

"Yeah, me too," I said, then paused, "except my hips and lower back hurt occasionally, and I have this weird tennis elbow thing that sometimes radiates into my wrist that could be arthritis . . . or cancer. I should probably go to the doctor. Otherwise, I could totally be in my thirties."

When I was growing up, we used to joke that my grandmother didn't know her actual age because she had lied about it so many times.

I am starting to see the appeal. I quit having birthdays after age 35.

But . . . if I have to be in my forties, as the train barrels on into mid-forty territory with nothing to derail it, I am going to milk my birthday as long as I can.

Welcome to my birthday weekend.

Not only did my birthday fall on a Friday this year, but it was also National Donut Day.

And the weather just happened to be perfect on my birthday.

The reason? Because I said this:

"All I want to do is go on a wildflower hike that is not too high and scary."

And Mother Nature listened.

Early in the week, this present showed up on the dining room table.

"That is the largest birthday gift I've ever seen. What is in that box, Dan?" I asked my husband.

What was in the box was something I had been talking about as a possible Christmas gift for this year or next. I didn't expect to get it this week!

Every elementary music teacher needs one of these.

This birthday card has me written all over it. My family must have thought so because I received two of them, one from my dad and one from my sister-in-law. Fun fact: I have done this exact thing in grocery stores more than once.

So that's it. My birthday is over until next year when I turn 35 for the ninth time. Now I have to go ice my wrist after all this typing. #overfortyproblems

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