Birthday Wishes

I turn a year older in a week's time! 

When I was younger, this was much cause for celebration. I remember a friend who would anticipate and plan her birthday with an almost vengence-like glee every year, announcing to all that her 'celebrations' or 'festivities' were a series of many dinners, parties, get-togethers with different groups of friends, lasting for as long as two weeks. 

And children (mine certainly) so often look forward to their birthdays simply because it's the perfect opportunity for them to lay claim to presents or privileges that their parents may otherwise consider too extravagant or indulgent.

For someone whose family circumstances meant that birthdays throughout childhood and teenage years largely passed unnoticed like any other day, I am now simply grateful for that obligatory song and cake routine, the chance to 'make a wish' and blow out the candles. And that birthday wish? For many more years of laughing, loving, learning and living to come, surrounded by all my wonderful family and friends.

'Twenty years from now 

you'll be more disappointed by the things you didn't do 

than by the ones you do. 

So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbour. 

Catch the tradewinds in your sails. 

Explore. Dream. Discover.'

                                                                                                        - Mark Twain -

Sheon