Thirty five

It was my thirty fifth birthday two days ago and I started this post in the bathroom that evening, supervising a splashy five year old kid – a kid I love – while my partner carved crockpot chickens for supper and the two year old watched Super Why. 

I got one sentence written before the bath was done. Dinner took over an hour, and at no point did the four of us sit at the table together. I tried to make my birthday cake three times before I finally succeeded once both kids were in bed, and it came out of the oven at 9 pm, shortly after my friend came over to talk about poly and navigating non-normative relationships while being saturated in endless normativity in our media and societal assumptions. 

Then it was the morning, more than twelve hours after I started this post. I was awake with the kids, since my partner got up with them the last few mornings. Step parenting is tough, but I love it. I love these kids, and I love being on such a functional team with my partner. But it’s hard to find time to write, time to think, time to do the self-care that is so important to me. It’s hard to find time for tarot, or tea, or much of anything. I’m always busy these days, it seems. With the kids, and seemingly endless part-time jobs – data entry and petsitting and admin work and anything else that comes up that can knock a few hundred off the credit cards. 

The lead up to this birthday was tough. 

I’ve been feeling like a failure – so many parts of my life are in transition and it’s hard to see progress in the middle of the process. 

I got this far in the post and then the kids needed food and my partner was awake and I was making brunch for friends and I didn’t get back to it for another day. I’m finishing it in the car while the two year old sleeps. Once she wakes up, we will join her cousin’s birthday party, happening at the park just outside the car door. Life offers so many metaphors. 

I’m thirty five now. 

This year feels important, and challenging. My goal is to have thirty five moments of celebration, and to keep track of them here. To fill my cup, to inhabit my Queen of Cups self. 

Onward!