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penfield"It's time to celebrate your birthday, It happens ev'ry year
We eat a lot of broccoli and drink a lot of beer
You should be good and happy that there's so much you can eat
A million people ev'ry day are starving in the street
Your daddy's in the gutter with the wretched and the poor
Your mother's in the kitchen with a can of Cycle-4
There's garbage in the water, there's poison in the sky,
I guess it won't be long before we're all gonna die.
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to you!"
- "Weird" Al Yankovic (American Parodist and Nerd Icon), Happy Birthday
Two of my personal VIPs celebrated birthdays recently: High school pal GDA on February 24 and the Magnificent Miss J. on February 25.
Many people associate aging past 30 with loss, contraction and/or deterioration. Our minds and bodies don't have the same elasticity they used to; as the world around us gets bigger, our lives seem smaller and our dreams seem farther away. It's an easy assumption, even though it's probably counter-intuitive and certainly counter-productive. I mean, aging is all about growth.
GDA knows something about growth. By the time he was a senior in high school, he was at least 6'2", and he hadn't even stopped sprouting. He now checks in at 6'5" or something, with feet the size of cross-country skis. And yet, as big as he is, he has always had enough room for others; he is naturally open-minded, open-armed and welcoming to people. It was as if his body had to accommodate an uncommonly large heart. These days, it's his family that is growing -- with a beautiful wife and two sons who may themselves grow up to be the world's first Nobel Laureate offensive linemen.
As for J., her growth is more subtle though no less profound, and would normally be the subject of a very moving and probably rather mushy dissertation on our relationship, complete with fawning thanks and praise for her as a woman, a person and a partner. But as a gift to her I'm going to skip all that deeply personal and possibly embarrassing exposition, and just tell her simply that if she's reading this, there's a cake in the refrigerator with her name on it. Literally.
We eat a lot of broccoli and drink a lot of beer
You should be good and happy that there's so much you can eat
A million people ev'ry day are starving in the street
Your daddy's in the gutter with the wretched and the poor
Your mother's in the kitchen with a can of Cycle-4
There's garbage in the water, there's poison in the sky,
I guess it won't be long before we're all gonna die.
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to you!"
- "Weird" Al Yankovic (American Parodist and Nerd Icon), Happy Birthday
Two of my personal VIPs celebrated birthdays recently: High school pal GDA on February 24 and the Magnificent Miss J. on February 25.
Many people associate aging past 30 with loss, contraction and/or deterioration. Our minds and bodies don't have the same elasticity they used to; as the world around us gets bigger, our lives seem smaller and our dreams seem farther away. It's an easy assumption, even though it's probably counter-intuitive and certainly counter-productive. I mean, aging is all about growth.
GDA knows something about growth. By the time he was a senior in high school, he was at least 6'2", and he hadn't even stopped sprouting. He now checks in at 6'5" or something, with feet the size of cross-country skis. And yet, as big as he is, he has always had enough room for others; he is naturally open-minded, open-armed and welcoming to people. It was as if his body had to accommodate an uncommonly large heart. These days, it's his family that is growing -- with a beautiful wife and two sons who may themselves grow up to be the world's first Nobel Laureate offensive linemen.
As for J., her growth is more subtle though no less profound, and would normally be the subject of a very moving and probably rather mushy dissertation on our relationship, complete with fawning thanks and praise for her as a woman, a person and a partner. But as a gift to her I'm going to skip all that deeply personal and possibly embarrassing exposition, and just tell her simply that if she's reading this, there's a cake in the refrigerator with her name on it. Literally.
