thoughts on birthdays.

When you are 4 and your mom makes you an awesome dinosaur cake, birthdays are great. When you are 6 and you get to pick your own cake (naturally you pick the one with ballerinas), birthdays are even cooler. When you reach 19, all you can think about is being 21! The most epic, celebratory birthday ever. Thanks to Taylor Swift, I felt pretty good about turning 22.

So what about all the other birthdays after that? We stop getting so pumped about dino cakes and alcohol (actually wait, I still like both of those).

I digress,

It is easy to feel the doom and gloom that is associated with growing older. I never expected it to happen this fast, but I definitely realized it this time around.

My birthday is on September 11th, so for the past 13 years, I have had a shadow over my birthday. It is a day of so much pain and sadness for all of us, especially those whose loved ones were taken from them.

However, having a birthday on one of the saddest days of my lifetime has changed my perspective of getting older. A birthday truly is a celebration. You celebrate that you've had the opportunity to live another year, experience new things and eat dino cakes.

Watching the news is hard when so many people around the world deal with pain, war, suffering and illness. It is easy to watch Brian Williams, sigh, change the channel and then snuggle back down on our couches to watch an episode of HIMYM. 

So I hope today, on my birthday and on all of your birthdays you make the conscious decision to not be sad, but be thankful and excited for the opportunity you have had to live another year. Birthdays are really the best days of our lives. Just as I have the opportunity to write this, you have the opportunity to read this, and we both have the opportunity to leave this world a little better than it was before we got here. 

Thank you for all of your kind birthday wishes! I am truly fortunate to have so many loving and caring people in my life. Please continue to remember those who could not celebrate another birthday after September 11, 2001 and live in a way that brings little piece of happiness to everyone around you.  

Because that was some heavy stuff, I leave you with this which is SO DARN TRUE.