At 30

Today was my thirtieth birthday, and it was a happy birthday, indeed. (And, thank you, everyone for the birthday well-wishes. I felt truly blessed!). Kevin took me out to my favourite restaurant, which happens to serve a wonderful non-alcoholic beer. And Colin presented me with a birthday card and flowers that he picked all all by himself ... after his daddy walked him over to the grocery store--a very big adventure for such a little boy.

All in all, it was a simple--and simply wonderful--birthday.

I know that's not the birthday most 30-year-old women have in mind. I think the standard thing is a wild night on the town with one's girlfriends, maybe a trip to Vegas or New York. And don't get me wrong, that all sounds wonderful, but I'm just not at a stage in my life right now where that is possible. (Maybe 35, girls? Or 40 at least ... )

I suppose such elaborate thirtieth-birthday celebrations are the norm because 30 is supposedly a "big" birthday for a woman: she's no longer some nubile young thing but a mature woman, perhaps a little past her prime. (Although why this should be true in the 21st century--when we all enjoy an extra decade of adolescence--beats me.) And for a lot of people, one's thirtieth birthday forces them to take stock of what they've done with their lives, so a whirlwind party can be a way to avoid such reflection or else a consolation if they are forced to confront things and find the balance wanting.

This may sound smug, but I only mean to express my gratitude: When I consider 20s, I am completely content with how they played out. I graduated from college, started a satisfying career, enjoyed some freewheeling years in a great city, lived abroad, married the man I love, and had a beautiful child (almost two of them!). I might not have done everything I wanted to do, but I did most of it, and I had a great time doing it. If my 30s are half as as much fun, I will be very lucky, indeed.

As a synchronistic end to my lovely birthday, Kevin took the above photo of me just before we headed out for my celebratory dinner. It happens to look very much like a photo he took of me on my 26th birthday, when we were vacationing in the south of France. Other than the fact that I am wearing the same damn blouse in both photos, I don't find the comparison too unflattering. Sure, Edmonton doesn't quite compare with France, and, yes, I currently weigh about 40 pounds more than I did then, but those things are just temporary, right? I hope that by my 32nd birthday I'll have lost the baby weight and we will again be traveling abroad without children. And I sincerely hope that by then I've bought some new clothes!

The weekend that wasn't

This past weekend it snowed. Again. It snowed the weekend before, too, even though that was the "May Long Weekend," the three-day weekend when Albertans traditionally plant out their annuals and seedlings because the threat of frost has finally disappeared for a while. But I didn't get to plant out my 32 heirloom tomato seedlings last weekend. I didn't get to work in my yard at all, which was a major blow for me, as the Alberta growing season is so short that you *have* to get everything in the ground by the May Long Weekend, otherwise, it won't have time to grow and bloom and fruit before the frost returns on September 1st.

Instead of playing in the yard all weekend as I had planned, I've spent the past two weekends cooped up with my in-laws, in a too-small house, with a toddler who's started throwing tantrums, and a dog who's started going stir-crazy and has taken a vocal dislike to my father-in-law. I'm starting to go a little stir-crazy myself. We've tried getting out of the house as much as possible: with Sunday brunch at the corner diner, trips to the mall, the zoo, and the museum. And there's always our fail-safe outing to the farmer's market and the bookstore to play with the branded toy train who-shall-remain-nameless. But we've run out of outings that are manageable for a toddler and two octogenarians, and we're all starting to get a little mouldy and cranky around here. By last Sunday things had gotten so dismal (thanks to a couple of mishaps with poo and a toddler who was on a food strike) that I think I was in tears three times before dinner time -- and I still had a whole day left in my three-day weekend.

So, on the final day of my three-day vacation, I boycotted everyone. I banished myself to the basement with the dog, who was starting to go feral because he'd been alone down there for days because he won't stop barking at my father-in-law. And you know what? We had a pretty good time. I played fetch with Remy in between unpacking the last of the boxes from our last international move two years ago--and from our previous international move two years before that. Remy started to act domesticated again, an, for the first time in four years, I saw the china my grandmother hand-painted for me when I was a girl. And even though the sky outside was black as pitch the robin's egg blue of that china lifted my spirits right up.

How do you deal with disappointing weekends? Do you have a trick for turning lemons into lemonade? Or have you had any surprising saviours on a dismal day?

Good Friday

Last Friday, Good Friday, was the rarest of all days in a household with a new baby, a high-strung dog, and a wiley cat -- an unqualified good day. It began with rain, an inauspicious sign in most places, but in the dry, sun-parched Alberta prairies where you don't see rain for nine months of the year, a little rainfall is a minor miracle in itself. It's also a sign that Spring is truly here.

While the rain fell outside, and the cat and the baby napped upstairs, and the dog chewed his bone in the basement, I threw open the windows and doors and stole a few hours of precious alone time to ... clean my floors. It may not sound very exciting, but I haven't been able to wash my floors since Colin was born, and with two animals in the house, my floors need washing on a weekly basis. I now understand why the pioneers made such an event out of "Spring cleaning." Giving one's house a good airing after a long, dirty, cooped-up winter is truly a cause for celebration. I even lit candles (to mask the scent of the floor cleaner), and the effect was almost holy.

By 10:30, I was washed and blow-dried and dressed (another minor miracle) and able to welcome my friend Amy into a freshly cleaned home to play with my freshly awake baby. Amy brought delicious cinnamon buns and held the Colin, while I got to enjoy my first cup of really piping hot coffee in months. It was a great visit. She's welcome any time.

Afterward, since Colin was still in such a good mood and the sun was shinning, we went out and did all of our grocery shopping for the holiday weekend, and by the time we were done, we got a call from Kevin telling us that he was coming home from work early, "because I'm ready to come home to my wife and child," he said. (If you inferred that these words don't cross his lips often, you would be right.)

With Kevin home, we put Colin in his pram and took him and the dog on a long walk in the sunshine. It was Colin's first really awake excursion into the out-of-doors, and he was mesmerized by the leaves rustling in the wind -- and Kevin and I were mesmerized watching him watch the leaves. I imagine that one of the greatest joys of parenthood will be seeing the world anew through his eyes. Like the first time I ever wore glasses, those leaves seemed to pop out in all their individual glory.

It being an official holiday (for everyone but workaholic physicists) the whole neighborhood was out enjoying the good weather: couples relaxing in lawn chairs, dads firing up their grills for the first barbecue of the season, and everywhere children riding bikes and playing ball. The neighborhood was just teeming with people, all so happy and carefree. And it was such a contrast to where we lived this time last year that my eyes welled up with tears of gratitude -- for the probably hundredth time -- that we now live where we do and that our lives are so much better than they were then. Even Remy seemed to understand that this day was special for me, and he didn't pull on his leash or bark at passers-by or roll in poo -- not even once.

Although it already seemed like a very full day, there were still hours of daylight left to us (the sun is up until 8:00 p.m. in the Far North these days), and so we took Colin out for another first -- his first swim. I recently discovered a recreation center with a heated, saltwater baby pool for my sensitive little boy, and it being a Friday night, and Good Friday at that, we had the place to ourselves to try it out. Again, Colin was mesmerized ... which is not to say he liked it. He didn't cry at least, but clung pretty tightly to us for the whole hour that we were there. Kevin and I certainly had a good time, though, getting to go out on a Friday night, when everything is usually closed to us.

And afterward, Colin was so happily exhausted that he went straight to bed without a fuss -- in his very own bed! If you've followed our sleep dilemma on this blog at a;;, then you'll know how miraculous an uncomplicated bedtime is at our house. I hadn't set out to get Colin sleeping in his own bed -- in fact, I rather enjoy sleeping alone helps my son to sleep for seven hours at a stretch. That's right, Colin slept -- alone -- for seven hours that night! This miracle has yet to be repeated at such long intervals, but ever since Colin has, at the very least, spent the first part of each night in his own bed and given his parents some much needed "alone time."

With our first night of "alone time" we did nothing more than curl up on the couch, eat frozen pizza, drink beer, and watch a pink sun setting over our neighbor's treetops, but in it's own way, it was the perfect end to a very long week and to our very good, Good Friday.