Birthday Weekend: Part Two

When I woke the Saturday before last, I'd turned forty during the night. Jeffrey brought me a cup of coffee in the Happy Birthday mug. I went to the kitchen for a second cup to find Bella had shredded her doggie bed. There were tiny bits of pale green fluff covering the floor. It was like she was trying to get in on the action so she provided her own confetti.

Pink roses decorated the kitchen. I opened two birthday cards from Jeffrey. Saturday afternoon we headed to Oxford, sipping coffee and nibbling on Mom's sugar cookies on the way.

We parked on the square and I got out my birthday gift: a new camera! It's fancy and also smarter than I am.

It was cold and windy - not an ideal day to be lazing about the square taking pictures. We had not choice, then, but to go upstairs to the City Grocery bar and have a glass of wine. Only they weren't open yet!

That left the haven that is Square Books.

From there we ducked into Ajax Diner. From the sidewalk glancing in it looked warm and cozy. We sat at the bar that was covered in 1977 Carroll County license plates, the old ones with the magnolia on them.

I love that at Ajax old-school Christmas lights are up year 'round, lights with big bulbs of primary colors.

We stayed long enough to have that glass of wine. It was growing dark by the time we left.

The famed courthouse in the center of the square. When I first attempted to take this photo, the lens cap was still on. So it wasn't quite as dark as I thought at first. Doh!

We met my brother and sister in law back in front of Square Books, where they gave me this birthday card:

I dashed into a convenience store restroom to change clothes for dinner. I took time to slowly put on red lipstick.

After looking around online, I had decided on Ravine Restaurant. I was hoping for someplace with soft candlelight and white linen tablecloths that was friendly, not snooty, cozy and inviting. When we walked in there was a fireplace in the middle of the room. Check. Mate.

We had a room to ourselves. The tables were covered with white tablecloths, candles, and low lighting, just as I'd pictured.

Forgive the out of focus photo. New camera!

It was all that I'd hoped for: great friends, delicious food, laughs.

Seared scallops atop a cauliflower puree.

When the waiter read the dessert specials it was like he knew we were coming: chocolate and hazelnut is one of my favorite flavor combinations. Chocolate hazelnut torte was one of the choices. Jeffrey loves coconut - anything coconut. He and I both love creme brulee. The first dessert the waiter listed was a coconut creme brulee. Delectable dessert with a cup of fresh coffee surrounded by friends - it was wonderful.

We hugged our friends goodbye. On the drive home I thought about the night, the entire weekend. Magical was the word that came to mind. What an incredible birthday.

To say nothing of working on my novel

This morning I'm almost paralyzed trying to write today's to do list because of the all the undone things looming from yesterday's to do list!

Birthday Weekend: Part One

If this weekend is any indication, it’s going to be a fabulous decade.

Sometime after Christmas I realized that, Hey, birthday month is just around the corner. And not just any birthday: my 40th birthday!

I wondered why I hadn’t started on decorations and guest lists and fabulous party favors and boxes of sparklers for guests with custom printed ribbon and (can you tell who loves Pinterest?) and on and on.

In short order I came out of that reverie. I am so glad my birthday worked out the way it did, without the overthinking and overplanning. I didn’t spend weeks making myself tired and anxious and overwrought. I didn't spend hours on the color of the napkins and the font on the invitations that should perfectly reflect, sum up, and symbolize me!

I didn’t do that. I bought packages of pink and silver tissue paper to make these paper floofs for the dining room. Didn’t do that, either. Forgot to even get special birthday napkins, or any napkins at all to serve with cake and ice cream. That was okay, too.

Jeffrey and The Child sent me gorgeous pink roses on my birthday eve. They're gorgeous, and, I told him, “They even smell!” Jeffrey said, um, yes, they are FLOWERS. I explained that often florist flowers have no scent at all whereas these smelled heavenly.

We went to my parents’ house for dinner that night. My mom fixed my birthday favorite: chicken pie. The chicken was flavorful and tender and with a bite of the flaky pastry – OH. So good. I asked Mom for iced sugar cookies for dessert, and they were exactly what I hoped for. The cookies were sugary and melted in my mouth. They were topped with a light glaze of creamy icing. Perfect.

After dinner I opened presents. Wait until I tell you what they gave me!

Birthday

I'm not sure if it's cheerful stubbornness or nostalgia for my 12-year-old self who watched the movie hundreds of times, I think I will always love Sixteen Candles.





No, I didn’t expect to wake up transformed. I just thought that turning sixteen would be so major that I would wake up with an improved metal state that would show on my face. All it shows is that I don’t have any sort of a tan left.

Just a few hours into this day and what a wonderful birthday already. Happy.

Photos and stories to come!

Yay grownup me

When I was little I did not enjoy going to church. To get to my Sunday school class I had to walk through another room where all these older kids hung out, mostly boys. When I left the house, before I was down the steps of our front porch I already dreaded walking that gauntlet. Not that the boys said anything rude or did anything mean. I hated walking through that room with all those people watching me. (I doubt they paid any attention but still. It felt like a long walk in the spotlight.) Those sixth grade boys, I would whine to my mother.

Our preacher was one of my best friend’s dad. He was a nice, nice man. He was a very smart man. I loved going to their house. I did not love his sermons, however. I found them to be long long long.

To top it all off, Mom insisted I wear a slip under my church clothes. I hated a slip. Whole slip, half slip, whatever. It was just another layer of scratchy clothes to put on. The whole business of getting ready took time away from Lost in Space on TBS that I was trying to watch before we had to be at Sunday school at 9:45.

I whined and asked Mom what was the point of wearing a slip. Whhhyyyyyyyyy? She said, “Because I said so, mainly. Also because people could see right through that skirt!”

And see what, I wondered? My legs. Big woo. When I am grownup, I told her, my little fists clenched, I will not wear a slip. Ever!

She shrugged.

I will be forty years old on Saturday and I am happy to report I do not wear a slip. Ever. I don’t even own one.

What I Learned From Being a Contributor to Reader Unboxed

I reviewed books for Reader Unboxed, a web site dedicated to reading enthusiasts. Reader Unboxed is now on hiatus.

First, people are nice. A community of fellow reviewers formed fast. Some contributors were more experienced and some widely known. All were friendly. There was no pecking order, just a sincere welcome. We all chimed in and commented on each other’s posts, pointing out how much we enjoyed their take on the book, praising a smart question the review raised, or thoughtful questions about the book. Complimentary comments, in other words. There was a notable absence of snark all around. It’s a vanilla adjective, I know, but sometimes it’s the best way to say it: Everyone was really nice.

Second, I am too nice. I found it extremely difficult to write an even-handed review about a book I didn’t like. The authors of these books had poured their hearts into them. Time, effort, creative spirit, love, work - untold hours of work, had gone into the novels. And I was going to come along and squash all that? Any time I typed out, “I had to make myself keep reading. The plot points made no sense. The character’s motivation was a mystery.” I would wince, thinking of the writer, then delete delete delete.

But I felt like I owed it to it fellow readers not to present a book I didn’t like as something great and wonderful. That would be unfair, too. (I’ve been burned more than once by reading a review, buying the book, and then wondering if the author was the reviewer’s brother in law or had we even read the same book.)

It was challenging writing a forthright review without being terribly vague and without hiding behind the Southern girl mantra (“Be nice. Be nice if it kills you. If you must, you can mutter, “Bless her heart,” but mostly: be nice.”).

My time at Reader Unboxed forced me to stretch as a reader, as a reviewer, as a writer. That is nice.

That's today

On days like today, Martin Luther King, Jr. day, I never know what to say. I don’t know what to say on Veteran’s Day or Memorial Day. I know that it’s important to stop and a minute on think about these people.

I admire the bloggers who get it just right, whose posts are beautiful and reverent and moving. I can’t come up with much to say that hasn’t been said hundreds and thousands of times before.

I don’t know as much about King as I should. Sometimes when we’re in Memphis we walk by the Lorraine Hotel. It gives me chills every time. I admire King and feel certain that if he were alive today, he’d be such a positive force. I think he’d be horrified and outraged at the welfare state. I think he’d help inspire and motivate rather than divide.

Again, I don’t know what to say. It didn’t seem right to post what I’d planned on posting (it wasn’t another screed about Haley Barbour, although it TOTALLY COULD HAVE BEEN) rather than at least acknowledging what today is. Right?