Happy Un-Birthday!

Today is not my birthday. It's not even my half birthday, which fell on Thanksgiving this year so I completely forgot to celebrate. It seems like a lot of people I know are having birthdays this month which has me thinking about birthdays. Yesterday my grandpa celebrated his 80th birthday. Lots of grandparents are 80, but if you sit down and think about it, that's a lot of birthdays. I feel like I've done a lot in my 27.5 years, but 80! That's a lot. So to celebrate this occasion we had a family party (a brunch) for those who could attend at the Greenwood Red Lobster. Yes, I said a brunch. It was the first time I'd visited the Red Lobster at brunchtime, but it was surprisingly busy. We planned to meet at 11:00 and since people were driving a ways, we all were there by 10 'til (well, that's when I got there, everyone else was already there and I have no idea how long they'd been there). The Red Lobster doesn't open until 11:00 so my parents, grandparents, aunt and uncle were waiting in their cars in the parking lot when I pulled in. I hadn't really thought about it being too early for a dinner restaurant to be open until I got there, but what I enjoyed the most about this scene was that my family were not the only people waiting in the Red Lobster parking lot Sunday morning for them to open the doors. There were three or four other carloads of people waiting on that Red Lobster manager to unlock the front door. Who knew? We had a lovely time and my grandpa enjoyed all of the attention.

In other birthday news, with the passing of my (uncelebrated) half birthday and all of these other birthdays I've been thinking about how old I am and how I feel about that, and I have come to a couple of conclusions. 1. I kind of like being as old as I am. I've gone through some phases where I feel like I haven't accomplished what I'd wanted by this time in my life, blah, blah, blah. But I'm kind of over that. I like being in my late-twenties. I feel like a grown up. I can take care of myself and my dog, do what I want-when I want, make my own decisions, and even admire an attractive older man (I saw Jeff Bridges on the Today Show this morning and I don't know what it is, but I'd totally make out with him if I had the chance). So I'm happy in my own skin...even if it is aging. 2. Most of the people that I spend a lot of time with who are "my age" (which is still calculated by what year you graduated high school) are 28 so I guess for that reason, I feel like I'm 28. Even though in reality, I'm a young 27 1/2. Now that I think I'm 28, I'm starting to feel a little bit of pressure because 28 seems like an important year for me. After 28 is 29 and by the time I'm 29, I really do need to have my sh*t together. For this reason, I've decided that I need more than a year to get through everything I need to do when I'm 28 so I'm just going to start being 28 now which gives me more like a year and a half which seems a lot more doable than 12 months, which can just fly by. So that's my plan. I think it's a good one.

Before I sign off, I'd like to send a special shout-out to the inspiration behind today's blog, Robby, who turns 28 today. Happy birthday, Robby, and good luck being 28 for just a year.