Happy Birthday to Me

Two years ago today, Skip set the bar on birthdays pretty high when he proposed in my classroom and whisked me away in a limo for a day filled with surprises.  Today, he ALMOST did it again.  Yes, he is in Argentina.  No, he wasn’t here to spend the day with me or to go out for my birthday dinner last night.  But, this morning, he managed to be the first person to say “Happy Birthday” and the first person to give me a present.   This isn’t just impressive because of the distance or the schedule he keeps when he is home.  It’s impressive because my birthday two years ago was about the first one he’d gotten right in five years. 

When we first started dating, Skip had a lot to learn about birthdays.  When we dated long distance, we had to plan trips to spend our birthdays together.  For his birthday that first year, I planned a weekend in Roanoke, got him great concert tickets, and a new wardrobe of clothes he acted like he wanted.  When my birthday rolled around I made arrangements to fly to visit him.  When he picked me up, he informed me he was going to take me shopping and let me pick something out.  He hadn’t so much as bought me a card.  A few years later, the NewSong schedule put him in Charlotte on my birthday, so I drove there and picked him up for a birthday lunch.  He came strolling out to meet me with my “present” tucked under his arm.  It was a T-shirt from a Winter Jam souvenir table.  It wasn’t wrapped, and there was no card. Happy birthday to me.

I point out these little birthday failures to say, you can teach an old dog new tricks.  When Emily delivered my presents this morning from Skip, I realized just how far our relationship has come and how much our love has grown and how blessed I am that I didn’t give up on him because of some imperfections.  He is busier now than he has ever been.  He works longer, harder hours and we see each other about as much as we did when we were dating long distance.  He had less than a week off for Christmas and had to prepare for a three week trip out of the country.  Yet, in all that hustle and bustle, he bought me a new sweater from one of my favorite stores, two new pairs of earrings, a matching necklace, a Starbucks gift card, and a new charm for my Pandora bracelet.  I still didn’t get a card; I got a hand written note that puts Hallmark to shame.

 At a time when I could’ve easily been feeling sorry for myself and our less than ideal situation; instead, I felt like the luckiest girl in the world this morning.  Happy birthday to me.  Bring on 30!