My Best Birthday Ever

I started on this post last night, but was too sleepy to finish it. It was my last night on earth as a twenty-something. Today I joined the ranks of grown-ups everywhere whose children will someday remember when their parents were thirty-somethings. Adulthood. I have arrived.

The rest of this post will be so self-indulgent. Grab a puke bag. I understand if you can't stomach it (unless you were one of my roommates. In that case, here's to you, Baby!)

Freshman Year: After hiding the fish in the cupboard for cleaning checks, we then forgot about him for TWO WEEKS. The little bugger was still alive, but in very murky water when we remembered him. He was re-Christened 'Trooper.' I say "the" fish, because he wasn't my fish and I refused to have anything to do with him. (Read: clean the fishbowl.) Half-way through the year, we acquired a new roommate. It wasn't long before we knew Heaven had smiled down us. xoxoxox, Cin.

Sophomore Year: Four roommates stayed together and we added two more. We lucked out again.

Our best buddy lived two doors down and we happily shared him. Really, really happily. New York Dave never forgot any of our birthdays. He gave us treats and decorations for every holiday. We were at BYU and couples' engagements were often announced in our ward bulletins. One day in my absence, NY Dave was perusing the announcements. (I'm sure he was often amused at the Mormon-mini-culture because he wasn't LDS.) The following week's bulletin ran our engagement. He even gave me a ring carved out of a peach pit to commemorate the event and I still have it. Another time, Nat made him pee blue in honor of his newly-dyed hair. We had a long-standing war of pranks and Nat was waiting for the perfect time to whip out her secret weapon: the ethylene blue. When New York Dave dyed his hair neon blue, we just had to celebrate it with a blue cake. Stubborn as a mule, he flushed the evidence before his roommate could judge its blue-ness.
NY Dave said he was an atheist. I mention this because I'm so used to gauging goodness and morality using a religious barometer. But he kept watch over us like a brother.

To see crazy used as a noun, read on.

We kept a quote board because we were HI-liarous and history-making. Katri (crows caw and you climb a tree) probably had the most quotes without even tryin'. It must have been the fermones (I'm sure she can tell me how to spell that.) She is a swimming fool. Well, after her nightly swims, she often ran into a certain Crazy from upstairs who would smell her and ecstatically say, "Aaaah, fermones." Yikes.

And I kissed a boy again. And it was about freakin' time. And it was seriously a mistake.

(and now I'm thinking, "what if he ever reads that?!" "He won't. Get over yourself.") *

My junior and senior years kind of meld together in my memory: I started working at the Museum of Art Cafe. I would walk to work around seven in the morning when it was still pretty dark outside. I remember one particular morning: the sky was dark blue and the stars were out and a sliver of the moon was visible. I felt such love all around me; for me and from me for God's creations.

I was really involved with my practicums and classes. All of my classes were with the same 21 girls. I made friends with some amazing teachers-in-the-making; the kind of teachers I would want my little ones to have and the kind of teachers I would want to be. I love Early Childhood Education. Late one night, after my freshman year, I felt like I needed to change my major. I thumbed through a fat catalog of programs and came back to the Elementary Education page where I had started. Then my eyes rested on Early Childhood Education and I thought, "Of course." I closed the book, went to bed, and never looked back. It was one of the best decisions I ever made.

Maybe because I felt so full of purpose and vision, I realized that I would live a happy life regardless of my marital status.

The summer after my Senior year I started dating like crazy.

He was a visiting soccer coach from the UK. I met him when I picked up my nanny-charge from a practice. He was Catholic and beautiful in a red-headed-muscular-Irish sort of way. I imagine all men in pubs look exactly like him. When he called the first time, I lied and said that I had plans. He said with an English accent, "Well, tha's a damn shame, id'n it." And I was hooked. I LOVED him. Very, very briefly. When it ended, I was over him in two weeks flat. It was so freeing and exciting and exactly what I needed.

Here's to The Rebound. (Really, I was his rebound.) He was LDS. He was from my hometown. He was adorable and made me laugh. But. He wasn't affectionate in front of his friends. Attn: Single girls everywhere! This is very, very bad! So I broke it off.

Let me repeat that: I broke it off. (Applause.)

Everything that happened after that was the beginning of the rest of my life and the reason why this was my best birthday ever.


*(Added later) P.S. You'll never guess who befriended me on Facebook. And just to refresh his memory, if he does happen to read this: you thought it was a mistake too!