Summer

My birthday is this week. I'll be 56 years here. When I was young, that seemed like a very long time. Now, I'm not as sure. It seems like it's been a long time, but my grandmother lived to be 98, so I've got the genes in me that say this could be just half way, only during the next half your back hurts a lot, your energy wains more than it waxes, and your mind wanders a lot.

I do know more now than say I did at 26 or even 46. For instance, I'm not nearly as smart as I thought I was at 26. I'm better looking, too. That happens to some men. Of course, at 26 I'd have traded that for a bigger dick. Nah, I wouldn't have either, but it sounds like something I'd have said. All in all, I'm pretty lucky. Hard work is a good virtue, but luck is a blessing from the universe itself. I'm lucky. I was born a (semi-) White male in the richest country on the planet. I could just have easily been born a third world woman.

I was lucky in that I was wanted by both my mother and father, and even though my father was killed when I was only 5, I was lucky in how my aunts and uncles and grandmother helped my mother and saw to my needs, emotional and physical. I hope I showed my gratitude to them as I grew up, and I hope I lead my life today in such a way that they would be proud of the sacrifices they made as they participated in my upbringing.

All of those things are filed under "luck." They were just blessings showered down by the universe.

I'm also rich. My mother would tease me and say that I only spend money like I'm rich, which in actuality, makes me poor. I disagree. Rich is a state of mind. I have an abundance of friends, health, good fortune, happiness. I laugh more than I cry and smiling comes easy. And while I don't have a lot of money, I have enough.

I have a comfortable home. I share it with a Maine Coon cat named Beauregard that I've had for ten years now. We're pretty closely bonded, but we're not all touchy feely about it. He hangs with me, follows me around the house, naps near where I'm working, and talks to me when he wants something as though he's sure I understand his language. He's always talked to me like that. He learned it from me, I suppose. I talk to him all the time like he's supposed to understand exactly what I'm talking about. Sometimes I think I'd rather have put that energy into a relationship with a human, but frankly, Beauregard isn't why I don't have a significant other, and since I don't have a significant other, I'm sure as hell glad I have Beauregard.

Where am I going with this? Oh yeah, give thanks. It's my birthday and I believe one is supposed to begin with a recitation of one's blessings and be thankful. I'm pretty sure the only way that one can adequately give thanks is to go forth and be generous in the world.

Blessed be.