Yesterday was a Tuesday, a typical workday for most. It also happened to be my birthday. This birthday was about as unassuming as a Tuesday. No entrance into a new decade or life phase, a hefty but not obscene amount of candles due for the cake. We had already celebrated the weekend before with a fancy (yet comfy on the dress code) dinner and movie out. I planned on yesterday being an ordinary day. And, in large part it was. Jason had to head out early for a meeting (due to a firefighter's convention downtown, the meeting was farther away than usual and a hotel room had been booked for him to spend the night due to evening and early morning events, which he assists in running). The kids and I ran to the fabric store for supplies for a new project. At lunch, Audrey and I discussed the latest books she's listened to over peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (mine all peanut butter, hers all jelly). We enjoyed one of Grammy's routine visits to spoil the kids with her attention and time.
On our calendar of events, things seemed pretty ordinary. But my email's inbox buzzed all day. Cards arrived in the mail and family members called. Grammy left and Audrey insisted that we bake a cake. (I have come to realize that in the child's version of the dictionary, next to the word "birthday" is a picture of cake - candle-torched icing-dripping cake). So, that's what we did. I pulled ingredients from the pantry and Audrey ran for her wooden stool. On weekends as we make pancakes, Jason tends to play music. I assume that, to Audrey, our cake-baking session must have felt like a Saturday, because my tech savvy little girl scuttled up the kitchen counter and managed (rather proudly) to turn the ipod on. In minutes we were baking to the breezy sounds of Colbie Caillat.
The cake was in the oven when I received a text message. "Leaving soon. What do you want me to pick up for dinner?" Jason had canceled his hotel room. He was going to get home a bit later than usual. He was going to have to go to bed a bit earlier than usual. He was going to have to wake up much earlier than usual. (On the whole, it may not have made much sense). But it was my birthday and he planned on showing up, dinner in hand.
I often like to celebrate the ordinary: a beautiful Monday might warrant the return of our hammock to the lawn; Nathan's laugh leads to an hour of nighttime play when we should both be asleep; Audrey's wonder at the rain stems to raincoats, boots, and a walk through the puddles. But sometimes, on a Tuesday, it's nice to be celebrated amongst the ordinary - to be pulled up by the kind words of others, the sweet gestures. For others to go to the trouble of showing up, of baking you a cake. Thank you to everyone for making an ordinary day one I was happy to call my own. A very merry unbirthday to you!
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