Tomorrow is my birthday! I’m holed up in the bedroom working on this very column while also eating the early birthday present of Girl Scout cookies I secretly stashed under the bed for exactly this purpose.
Outside my door, birthday plans are being plotted based on the sly glances and strange code words my kids and husband used before I came in to write….
I love my birthday now, but that wasn’t always the case. When I turned 25, for example, the term “quarter-life crisis” was just coming into fashion, and boy, did it suit my situation.
I had been a successful student in high school and had gone on to a “good college.” Graduation meant I’d jumped through all the designated hoops but was suddenly adrift. Thanks to that college degree, finding a job wasn’t hard, but crafting a life was less straightforward — jumping through the hoops had in no way prepared me for the vast, open fields of adulthood.
Looking back, I really had no sense of myself or my place in the world, so it was no surprise that I felt confused, overwhelmed and terrified of getting older.
Now, a 48th turn around the sun is about to begin, and most of that youthful angst feels a lifetime in the past. Apparently, for me at least, having a quarter-life crisis prepared me for a midlife one, and therefore, the midlife one hasn’t been nearly as disorienting. Yes, life is passing much, much more quickly than I could have imagined at age 25, but the second half has been a lot more fun than the first.
Meanwhile, in the lead-up to my birthday, I was trying to convince my family to get me a Shetland pony colt.
According to the Chinese zodiac, 2026 is the year of the horse, and coincidentally, is also the sign for the year I was born. Longtime readers know I have been trying earnestly to get back to my childhood love of horses, which has, unfortunately, been superseded by an adult fear of horses. Because my first experience of horse love was with a sprightly gray Shetland aptly named Pixie, I’ve been thinking that working with a young Shetland might help me overcome my timidity around the horses we already have.
If I’ve learned anything over the last few years on the ranch, it is that while adding new animals to the menagerie may solve one problem, it usually creates at least two new ones.
And all, my knowledgeable horse friends assure me that a Shetland is a good way to add nine or 10 problems. (Apparently, Shetlands have a well-known nickname that replaces the e with an i… though Pixie remains as proof this is not a universal truth.)
For literally years now, I’ve written columns about not learning from my mistakes, especially when it comes to acquiring baby animals, and I am secretly more than a little proud that the wisdom of my experience has not done much to change my actions when it comes to matters of the heart. Perhaps that’s what being young at heart really means — you don’t let past calamity prevent you from embracing future joy.
But I know my husband would appreciate my not bringing home another project, and I would, too. I’ve already got a lot of chores.
The older I get, the less worried I am about figuring it all out. As of this very moment, I have not fully given up on the idea of a birthday pony, but there are no official plans for one, AND I’ve also managed to eat an entire sleeve of Girl Scout cookies, which is already giving me a stomach ache (and is another example of not learning from past mistakes).
However, when my daughter came in a few minutes ago and caught me mid-bite, (“Mama! Are you eating cookies!?!”) we both laughed so hard we almost peed our pants. In other words, I stand by the idea that some mistakes are worth making again and again.
So here’s to getting older and wiser, but not TOO much wiser!
