Strongly Worded

Life in the 30s

So 30 has been fun so far. My actual birthday fell on the first night of Passover, which is cool because it’s been exactly 30 years since the holiday fell on April 2nd.

On the day I was born, people interrupted their matzo-ball making to visit my mom and my newborn self in the hospital. My dad showed up at the seder wearing a new pink shirt in honor of my being a girl. He gave my mom a garnet ring (which is now one of my prized possessions). And, on my birthday every year, he gives her roses (he always says it’s absurd that the kid gets all the attention for being born, when it’s the mom that does all the work). This is a romantic notion, and should be widespread.

At this year’s seder I enjoyed a Dayenu-Happy Birthday medley, and then guests serenaded me with some songs that incorporate joy (because that’s what I’m into), namely “Jeremiah was a Bullfrog (the refrain is “Joy … to the World”), and that ‘80s ditty by Rob Bass (“Joy … and Pain … and Sunshine, and Rain”). I’d been looking forward to the evening for ages, and I had a great time.

On the actual day of Passover, I vegged out. I watched The Holiday on Netflix. It is an insipid flick with Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet, both of whom should have known better. I cleaned up my house, napped, and had a massage in the evening.

Then yesterday I went to work and realized that I’d completely forgotten about a meeting with our State Senator. I scheduled this meeting ages ago, in some kind of haze. I raced into the office and tried frantically to drum up some coherent evidence of why he should support funding for foreclosure prevention. It was snowing (yes, snowing on April 4!) and I couldn’t find my subway card, and I threw on some Grown up Clothes and raced to the State House, allowing oodles of extra time since they have strict security over there and I’ve only visited House members in the past and thought that Senators might work in a different building.

I was so unnecessarily stressed. There no one in the security line, and the senators are really close to everything. Then it turned out that our local boys’ HS basketball team just won the State finals. The players were invited to the State house and the Senator’s office was in shambles (pizza boxes everywhere). I was relegated to talking with the 21-year-old-iced-coffee-toting aide.

Then I returned to the office and found that my co-worker had (at my request) purchased a shredder. It cost $120. When I blanched, he said gleefully: "it can shred a small child".

Posted by Dori at 10:53 AM