Today is my birthday

It’s my birthday, and today I am 57.

I don’t know what I thought 57 might be like when I was 50. I don’t think I thought this far.

I remember stressing about turning 40, and then that fret seemed ridiculous. I got anxious about 50, and then it was weird that I’d been worked up about it. But three years ago the end of this month, when I was diagnosed with breast cancer, I stopped focusing on my age.

I started doing what I think of as cancer math.

Which is to say, I started fixating on the ages of my kids. If I had five more years, they’d still be teenagers. Ten more, they’d be in their 20s. Twenty more, in their 30s. Etc. It completely changed how I thought about my age. I just wanted to be alive and as healthy as possible for as long as possible.

Three years ago, when I turned 54, my mom had just died three months prior, and I tell you for a fact that 53 was not enough years to have her in my life. I will need my mama until I’m dead.

This I know, in the way I know that I need to breathe and drink water.

I don’t suggest that I’m now living only for my children, or that with lack of focus on number I’m not concerned with wrinkles or how my butt looks or whatever. I wish I weren’t, but I am. Not all the time, but those baggages are still there.

Now Nick and I have begun to look at the things we want in our lives, and what we can do sooner rather than later. There are places I want to go in this world—Cambodia tops my list—and sooner is more predictable than later.

This, however, has not been a year for gallivanting.

In January, we bought a house in Maine. I love Maine (in the summer), and this has been Nick’s dream since well before we met. It is a retirement plan, plus in lieu of renting a place when we come up to Maine every summer, now we go to our very own house. We’re renting it out when we’re not here, because it is a whole nother house, which is no small thing to take on. But it’s pretty great.

We’re on a small, quiet lake, in a town with one general store and no stoplight. It’s completely different from our lives in DC. We have a yard and a lake. At night when you go out you can hear not just the loons, which I adore, but also the frogs and crickets. You can see the stars.

I stayed up until 12:30 this morning to see the Perseids meteor shower. I saw stars, but nothing moving, so I set my alarm for 3:00 am. By then the sky had clouded over, so nothing doing. Rats.

It rained overnight, drenching the clothing and towels we’d hung out to dry. But I love watching the mist rise off the lake and the sun burning off the cloud cover. I’m hoping for a clear night tonight.

Nick bought me two paddleboards for my birthday. I asked for one, and he bought two so two of us could go out together.

I’d only been paddleboarding a few times before, and I loved it. So I’m learning.

A big thing I’ve learned is that there are fronts and backs to paddles, and if you have the paddle facing the wrong way, it’s significantly harder to get where you want to go. One of the paddles is marked “front” and “back” and that’s the one I now use.

I think it’s akin to being bad at left and right, or always having to say Never Eat Shredded Wheat to figure out where north is. I keep having to look down and read the words.

I asked India to get a nice photo of me paddleboarding, which turned out to be a grand challenge. Because the light is finicky, and you need the light behind the photographer—but you need the subject to be at a good distance and a good angle. Which, with my paddleboarding proficiency, proved significantly more frustrating than one might expect.

Fortunately India was extremely patient.

Both kids kept giving me instructions on how to paddle to correct my position, and I was trying but kept going further out into the lake. I can only seem to turn one direction, and only in a ridiculously wide arc. I kept winding up down the lake before I got myself turned around.

I wonder if it says something about me that despite my best efforts, I was either in the middle of the lake or straight into the weeds.

But I love it.

I love doing yoga on the paddleboard, because it requires so much balance, strength, and focus. It forces you to calm your breath and stay present. With my noisy brain, those are two things I’m bad at.

Yesterday, I managed a headstand on the board. It’s particularly difficult with the lack of stability of water, and I maintained it for a while. I’m quite proud of myself.

While I was out there, India said, “HOLD your headstand! I’m going to do a panoramic! It’s going to be so cool!”

So I held it until I could no more.

When I got back to the dock, she handed me the phone to look through the photos.

This, my friends, is that extra-special birthday panoramic.

Thank you for being part of my life as I begin another year around the sun.

I’m immensely grateful to be here with you in this life. I’m thankful for my family, for loved ones, for my friendships near and far. I believe nothing matters more on this earth than the people you love who love you.

Thank you for reading and commenting and sending me notes. I love when a post resonates so much with someone that they share it with a friend, or write me an email with their experience and perspective. I can’t tell you how meaningful these connection are to me.

Thank you.

Big hugs and love,

Lisa