Happy 31st Birthday to Me

The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself. --Anna Quindlen

How did 31 happen? I swear it was just last summer and 30 was here. This past year has been full of momentous things and mundane things. I am trying to figure out if it has been a very good year or a very bad year. My babies are still healthy and growing strong (and I, myself, am still present!) so I will have to say it has been a good year. I remember my 10th birthday party. I remember turning 11. I can remember turning 13. I remember who was there, and who was not... and why I thought them not being there was probably the end of the world. When I turned 15, I remember thinking some things that happened that summer were the beginning of my real life... And I remember thinking that some things that happened later that year were the end of the world... But every day came and went and I learned a little bit more about how to survive. How not to let other people control how I felt so easily. How to decide some things for myself. How to make up my own mind and not to look to others to tell me what to think or how to feel. I am still working on this. Every single day. And probably always will. But I am definitely no longer as weighed down and suffocated by it as I was 15 years ago, or even 5.
I blew out my 31 candles this year surrounded by people I love. I was just going to have 24 pink candles but for some reason I really wanted all 31 years represented there. So we found some more candles. I was happy to see them all glowing there, and that it took me more than one breath to get them all out. They have all been valuable to me. Every year got me to the next year, and the next... And even years that were painful, if I had a time machine, would I go back and change what happened? I don't know. I am not so sure I would. Would one little step in my path made easier lead me away from where I am now? Would Jonathan and Anna still be here? They have made every little bit worthwhile. If I had a time machine, maybe I would not use it to go back and change events. Maybe if I got one as a birthday wish, I would go back to when they were babies. Those late night feedings, just me and one of them. I would love to smell their sweet baby hair again, feel their tiny hand wrap around one finger, see them look up at me while nursing, studying my face in a most calm and studious manner. I would like a time stretching machine. I wish I could go back to those especially sweet moments in life and just make them last a little longer.
In ten years, when I am 41, and they are 17 and 15, I will probably again wish for a time machine. Except, maybe then I will want to go back to now. When they were 7 and 5. Right now is precious. Maybe that is part of what I need to figure out. :)