I Can’t Drive 55

……but I’m gonna rock it, that’s for sure!

It certainly started out happily enough. Will took me to Macy’s after Mass and bought me a bottle of my favorite perfume—my one indulgence in the cosmetics department. This stuff is wildly expensive compared with my usual Bath and Body Works scents, but it smells heavenly and stays on all day long, and I love smelling like a woman instead of a fifteen-year-old girl. Then we walked through the mall holding hands, which drew more than our share of smiles from passersby.

God, I am so thankful to still have him here by my side…..It’s funny how our “wish lists” get shorter as we grow older, because what we want is basically more of what we already have: more precious moments with those we love, more laughter, more family, more friends. And yesterday, all those wishes were fulfilled.

Friends and relatives blew up my Facebook page with birthday posts. Several of my frequently-visited websites also sent me greetings along with individual members, some of whom I didn’t even know were following my posts. I was also recognized in church and made Father laugh when I told him I was 39 again—just practicing until I got it right. Then it was off to spend a fun-filled afternoon and evening with my son and daughter and their respective spouses and kids, who threw me a birthday party fit for a queen.

The house was filled with people, and there was food and drink and gifts—one from a lovely woman I’d never even met. (Uh-oh, you can tell that I’m getting old by the use of the word ‘lovely’, but it’s the only fitting description I could come up with.) She and her husband are friends of my son and son-in-law, and they’re going to invite us for dinner at their house soon because they liked us immediately. How cool is that—I got a present and new friends too, all in the same day!

Then they all sang the Happy Birthday song, which made me blush a little because I haven’t had this big a deal made of my birthday since my 40th. Dinner was wonderful, and we had cheesecake (my favorite) for dessert. I even got to watch my football game on their 50-inch flat screen TV. In other words…..I got spoiled rotten.

Today there’s an afterglow, and the memories of this birthday will make me smile for the rest of my life. You see, material things are good and useful, but it’s the intangibles that make life worth living. Like holding hands with my husband as we stroll through a busy shopping mall. Like seeing the love flow between my children and their spouses, and knowing that they are happy. Like hearing 17 people sing the birthday song and feeling the energy in the room wrap me in its warm embrace.

I am truly and wonderfully blessed. And if the price I pay for it is silver in my hair and aching joints, so be it……I’ll take being 55 any day. 🙂