Another candle on the cake

I love my birthday. LOVE it.  It is MY own holiday.  In fact, I love it so much, I usually celebrate birthday week.  Not just for me either.  I do birthday week for my children too.  I like the whole thing too.  I like cake. I like presents.  I like cards.  I like gatherings with the people that I love and who love me. I like champagne and wine...and there is usually plenty of that flowing for my birthday festivities! There are holidays for all kinds of stupid shit,  (Please do NOT get me started about Valentine's day...) but birthdays are the day the good Lord gave us to celebrate ourselves. 

Well, I haven't been my usual chipper party self this year and that's really pissing me off right now. Yes, it's been an absolutely crap year but that's not what I mean. What I mean is that this is the first year I started to understand all of those women who cry on their birthday and sit in a dark room and will it away.  Yes kids. To add insult to injury and pile on to ALL the other injustices I've endured , this year gravity has begun to wage it's war on me. Now don't start planning all your replies to me about how great I "still" look and how I "look good for having had children."  Hear me out dammit.

You may have noticed if you've read the other posts that I am Puerto Rican. : )  Hence, I have always had a big ass.  I should pause here and make it very clear that I like having a big ass.  Well, in the past year, my lovely and most favorite body part has started to forget it's address and has started shacking up with my upper legs.  It's an absolute affront!  NOBODY wants the Butt-leg!!  WHY, I ask you, is my ass fooling around with my legs? What happened to the lovely curve there, that existed to separate the 2 properties?? Did it get evicted?  Oh, but yes it did. By none other than that rat bastard Gravity.

And Gravity is working on other parts of me too.  Don't think it's just working on just one region.  No sir.  It has started squatting on what used to be my upper arms and I now "lovingly" refer to as my mud flaps. (No, not those mud flaps...come on now. Get your minds out of the gutter. If I ever start blogging about my nether regions, I fully expect someone to come and confiscate my laptop.) You know what I mean, when you're waving and your entire arm jumps in on the action? If I waved with both hands I'd friggin take flight. Don't even get me started on the road map Gravity started on my forehead. When the hell did these lines start getting built? I know I frown quite a bit but DAMN! Now when I quit scowling, some of the squinty lines stay put. Then there are the dark circles and the random aches and pains I'll just wake up with. When did this all happen? Have I been so busy wallowing that I didn't notice? And could the past year be to blame for the aging I've suddenly started to endure? Oh Helllll NO!!

I know that aging is ultimately a privilege and that I should be gracious about it. I really do.  Truly, no matter how low I get I understand that every new day is a gift and it is meant to be lived to the fullest and appreciated.  But I am not ready to start conceding defeat just yet either! I don't want to be sitting in my room all alone on my special day crying and waiting for it to be over.  So, yes, some things may have started to change. Maybe some of them I can do something about.  And maybe some of them, I'm just going to have to start getting used to.  But on this next birthday coming up, I am going to get my sad, sorry (newly located) ass all done up. I'm going to rock my highest heels. I'm going to straighten up my posture (even if I'll have that weird lower back thing later) and I am going to surround myself with those who truly love me. Who don't see any of these new changes(yet!) and see through to the real me and love me still. I'm going to endure the embarrassment of being sung Happy Birthday in front of a whole lot of strangers and prepare my lungs to blow out one more candle on the cake. I'm going to happily celebrate ME. And come what may in this next year, I am going to thank God for each new day he gives me and whatever he throws my way.

Change must come

If you've read this blog before, you know that times have been rough around here lately.  I have been feeling pretty low.  When I get down on myself, I tend to look at my contribution to the events that have occurred and ask myself what, if anything, I could have done to prevent them from happening.  Did I do something wrong? Could I have changed the outcome for the better?  Hell...I could drown in the "coulda shoulda wouldas" these days.  I'm 'bout sick of all of this damn moping.   I am not a damned wuss and I will not go out like this.  Well then kids, it is officially time for a change.  I truly believe that if you change your surroundings that things will change for the better.  A life Feng Shui  if you will.

I took a little trip last January during one of the darkest periods of my life.  I went to Sacramento to visit a dear friend and had a much needed get-away. In addition to getting to hang out with one of my most favorite people, I looked around and realized; I was in California! I was most unprepared for my reaction. I remember stepping out of that airport and feeling something that I had not felt for a long time here in Nashville.  I felt pulled...like that was the exact place I was meant to be at that moment.  In fairness, I am a New Yorker and I guess I kind of knew that I was not destined to live in the South forever. So I shouldn't have been totally shocked to have felt like my time here was ending.  Things happened here that made me believe I could stay.  Some of those very things changed completely and are the reasons this city just ain't home no more....

On that day though, I felt more at home than I had since I was a kid coming back to Brooklyn from summer vacations with my Dad.  The trip was fun, but now I was home... Except, my visit was the opposite of that.  When I got to my vacation destination, something clicked.  I don't really know why.  I just know that I have missed that feeling since.  I got back to Nashville and realized that this was no longer my home.  It stopped being as much somewhere along the way and I don't know exactly when that happened but I've felt lost here for a long time.  I just don't belong here anymore.  I guess I've known that deep down for a long time.

Something about California spoke to me. Drew me in. You might think me crazy trying to move clear across the country to a state that is in a financial disaster for nothing more than some gut feeling.  I concur. Having admitted that though, I've chosen to ignore my gut instinct a few times in my life and it's ended pretty disastrously so I'm just going to go for this.  Anyway, what have I got to lose really?  The only thing keeping me here is my family.  Guess what? They'll always be my family.  I'll miss them terribly, but they're making their own lives too.  I'm jobless.  Again.  What rooted me here has lost its damn mind and doesn't actually even exist anymore.  My friendships here are of the sort that I don't worry will fade.  I have made quite the circle here.  Some of these people have held my hand through the darkest hours.  Have laughed with me. Cried with me. Have eaten with me and my family... have become my extended family. The ones that matter will continue to be near and dear to my heart even if there is distance between us. Those ties, I don't worry about.

I will be sad leaving here though.  I'll cry like a damn fool when I go.  There are memories and places and people...  There are things that I am going to hate to leave behind and there are some others that I cannot wait to never see or think about again.  But I am SO ready for new places and faces and things.  I haven't had a sense of adventure about my life in so long.  I want to feel a spark about getting out of bed in the morning and looking forward to exploring new things.  I want my girls to enjoy the ocean and the mountains.  I want new friends and relationships.  I want to hike and swim and snowboard!  I'm ready.  It's time.  I can feel it.  If I stay here I'll die a slow one. So I bid you goodbye Nashville.  My days here are quite literally numbered and that's just fine by me!


In closing, I'll borrow a few words from someone who has already said them perfectly before me:

"It's been too hard living, but I'm afraid to die
Cause I don't know what's out there beyond the sky
It's been a long, long time coming
But I know a change gon' come..."