Dirty, Flirty, Pertty Thirty

I have been anticipating this day for about three months (since the beginning of my 1/3 life crisis), and it’s finally here!  Here’s my plan for the big day:

1. Wake up (but lay in bed while Scott gets the boys ready)
2. Open very thoughtful gifts from the boys (I actually have NO idea what they got me this year--weird)
3. Take Will to school (hey, it’s all-about-me-day, but Will still has to get to school)
4. Grab a hot chocolate at the Starbucks at Barnes and Noble
5. Pick up the cookie cake I ordered from Great American Cookie
6. Put Ben down for a nap, and take a little snooze myself
7. Finish preparing the house for my birthday party (re: making sure that the bathrooms don’t smell like pee and that the beer is on ice, not necessarily in that order)
8. Pick Will up from school
9. Wait for jump castle to arrive (I’ll be the one pressing my face against the front window and then shrieking when the truck pulls up)
10. Eat, drink, and jump (crossing fingers that the cookie/wine/jump castle combo does not turn out badly)
11. Fall asleep after all guests leave (important, as I doze off easily in my old age)

Approximately 19 1/2 years ago, I was sitting in my living room, playing cards with my mom on a Saturday afternoon when SURPRISE! her best friend from MO showed up at the front door for my mom’s thirtieth birthday.  My dad and I had already given her her gifts--a sweatshirt and coffee cup we had ordered from the popular TV show, thirtysomething.  (I recently watched several episodes of thirtysomething on Netflix and related to way too many of the issues.)  I’ve been revisiting this memory over the last few months and am a little baffled that it’s my turn.

Growing up, I was an only child, and though I would argue that most stereotypes of only childhood don’t apply to me (self-centeredness, inability to get along with others, etc.), birthdays were always a really big deal.  It was the one day of the year that I felt like I was the center of the universe.

So many women look at each birthday with a sense of impending doom, like life just gets more complicated each year.  (What’s up with women who won’t tell their age?)  I’ve listened to women as long as I can remember complain about husbands or children who forget birthdays and anniversaries.  

What an awful way to live.  Here’s my message to those women (and my mantra for the next decade): stop complaining and throw your own damn party!

Happy birthday William Carlos Williams, Hank Williams, Kyle Chandler, and Doug E. Fresh!  You’re welcome to join my party.