Pick A Number Between 35 and 40

I like to think of my birthday as a fresh start for the coming year. Kind of like a personal New Years. I get to recount what I loved or loathed about the year behind me and I get to mentally make lists of those things I hope to do or defend over the next calendar year. That is kind of a gift in itself.

Well, for a fresh start, I think the best beginning is a breakfast that includes cupcakes. Really fabulous cupcakes. I love my husband for thinking this way--he gets me. He can get bagels and lox and mimosas and coffee and scones. But really, it's all just a prelude for cupcakes. Big, sexy cupcakes with mounds of frosting flowers balanced on a soft yummy cake. I think I am in just the right frame of mind now...

Okay, pick a number between 35 and 40. That's where you'll find me. Still feeling like it would be completely rational to name something like 26 and not be wrong. I am at that very un-cool age that isn't yet empowered and still has that awkward gait. This feels like some sort of emotional repeat of seventh grade. Everything is new and bigger and broader. I have to own up to being a wife and a mother and I have to be new at both of those things.

I don't particularly like being new--it scares me not to know what happens next.