Birthday Reflections

This may shape up to be one of the best birthdays ever.  I have a love/hate relationship with my birthday.  I love having them because it means I am still alive and breathing.  I hate them because I always get depressed.  Everything bad that I have ever believed about myself (most of them lies) haunts me on my birthday.  My allergies and migraines have always kicked in big time around my birthday, mostly due to the myriad of maple trees around us (which start to wake up in February).

All that is different this year.  Since we moved my allergies have improved drastically (few maple trees, no mold).  We came to Virginia for a visit to my brother and his wife.  They are one of God's most wonderful and special blessings in my life.  The days here are an incredible birthday gift from God (and them and my dearest, sweet and thoughtful hubby) and I am savouring every minute of it.  The weather is a major factor.  It is in the 50's and the daffodils are coming up.  In my mind, spring should always start to appear in February, not April or May!

At the end of this week we go to help celebrate the life and passage into Heaven of my dearest aunt.  The very last of my parents' generation to leave this life.  She was, to me, the epitome of one who is refined like gold.  The flame grew brighter in her as the years passed and this life dropped away from her.  I can hear her laughing, because she was ready to go.  That's how I want to be.  Yes, she had physical challenges in recent years, but she was able to retain who she was and continued being a light and a blessing to others right up to the end.

I have decided to keep my Joy Dare journal on paper.  I can't help it.  I need to have that piece of paper to write on and embellish.  And I have a lovely journal given to me by a dear friend.  Posterity will just have to read my journal, not my blog.