So I was thinking that a birthday is really a New Year's Day.  You've run out of one year of life and you're embarking on the next one and isn't it really packets of 365 or 366 days (Leap Year, you know) that form years.  My year's boundaries are different than yours, though they intersect.  Or something like that.

You'll have to forgive my wandering into abstract math-like observations.  I'm in the house with The Guys again and Jean's soft feminine presence has been back at school for almost a month.  Life is more than a bit skewed to the masculine sensibility now.  Take my birthday, for example.  There wasn't a card or shred of wrapping paper in sight.  The Guys mumbled their good wishes, though they did produce cake tonight and just to indulge that tinge of sadist in me, I managed to manipulate them into singing to me.  Oh, it was pretty funny!

But at least it was birthday-like; no candles, no fussing over details and surprises, but the necessities were covered.  To express it as an analogy:

"Today" is to "Birthday" as

" " is to "Birthday Cake"

Returning to my earlier proposal that a birthday is like New Year's, I've been thinking of some New Year's resolutions as I start this next year of my life.   I've resolved to tame my fear of driving in Chicago and go to visit Eric whose job is keeping him too busy to visit here.  I am going to forsake the Guys and visit Jean for a weekend to re-femeninize my experience.  I may start writing more regularly again.  That "I may" doesn't exactly sound like a resolute resolution, but it's a start back and New Year's is the time for starts, isn't it?

The only other observation I have about birthdays is that when you work with little kids, they hear "birthday" and the question "How old are you?" pops into their heads and out of their sweet innocent mouths in the exact same sentence.  Innocent babes that they are, they always seemed bewildered when I evaded giving a precise answer.

Here's to a Happy New Year.