Celebrate

Couple of interesting conversations with Mom regarding Thanksgiving.

“What’s R doing for Thanksgiving?” “Uh, working, probably. He’s the new guy.” “Well, if he’s not working that day, be sure to let him know that he’s welcome to join us.”

_{This is the first time she’s made an explicit invitation to him. Of course, with the potential baby-daddyness, I guess she’s looking at him in a new light.}

“I told FFB that he’s welcome to join us, if that’s okay.” “Of course it is…he’s practically family.”

_{He declined, graciously…he’s planning to celebrate with his quasi-stepdaughter. Which touches me…just when I think I’ve got him figured out, he does things like this.}

That’s when I realized that R and FFBare family. Not legally, but in the way that counts.

I may not have a large, close biological family, but that doesn’t mean I can’t create a family.

I passed my driving test yesterday. This is huge for me. I have put off getting my license for so long, partly out of anxiety and partly out of apathy. This is definitely something that needs to be celebrated.

The only trouble is that I’m not quite sure how. So I’m putting the question out there—how would you celebrate?

I felt like I had a good balance this year of spending time with my sweetheart and time to myself. Yesterday was Beltane proper. My sweetheart and I spent some time poking around the local markets before heading off to a movie. We took a lovely walk at dusk and had a good heart to heart.

Today I spent the morning rereading an old favourite of mine and spent some time in the afternoon doing some contemplating. It was lovely.

The roses in the neighbourhood are spectactular at the moment. A friend of mine brought me a huge bunch from her garden the other day and they are currently decorating my desk. They’re a little past their prime now, but when they first arrived they looked like a wedding bouquet. My study smells glorious.

The weather has been quite hot. I can certainly see why the Celts thought of Beltane as the first day of summer—it certainly feels like it here. The wonderful greenery around here is starting to turn brown, though the lawn is still going berserk. It’s such a contrast to last Beltane, which was overcast and cool.

at my local community centre this saturday

having beer and going abroad, relaxing more – i have a lot to be proud of, i have stuck at salsa dancing on and off for 2 years. passed 3 karate grades, had a full drivers licence for over 1 year (and been driving for 5 months so far without any accidents. i have 5 gcse’s and i have managed to live totally independently for over 2 years now in my own place. pluse i managed to totally give up alcohol for 4 and a half years (although this was perhaps my downfall and lead to me losing friends in the process)

also i have kep the same friends for several years and held down jobs for a year

September is one crazy month. I’ve managed to celebrate about five different birthdays so far. Some merely required dinner out with friends. One entailed a visit to my sister for a few hours. It was a nice, relaxed visit with passionfruit cheesecake. She does shift work, so it was great we could catch up and that she had the day off. My sweetheart also had the week off for his birthday. We took it easy, went to the local flower festival, had a walk in one of the state parks, had a family dinner. It was great to see him relax.

I was also bridesmaid at my mum’s wedding. I had a fantastic time, getting to wear my gorgeous dress and catch up with lots of old friends of the family. Mum looked wonderful and was clearly very happy.

Ostara is today and after everything that has been happening, I decided to have a very low key celebration. Some less than pleasant weather had me foregoing the ramble in the hills I had planned in favour of some downtime inside.

It cleared up enough for me to have a walk around the front and back yard, as I have been doing lately. The trees all have green shoots and my flower bed is a riot. I picked some irises, bluebells and freesias for my altar to go with the gemstones—moonstone, bloodstone, rose quartz and tourmaline quartz. There’s jasmine oil in the burner.

My mum and stepdad dropped by for a visit this afternoon, having just returned from their honeymoon in Hawaii. They were full of lots of interesting stories and I had a wonderful time just listening to them all.

Tonight I’m off to watch anime with a bunch of friends.

Going to go do a pedicure and manicure on myself now! If I can’t reach my toes very well then hubby gets to paint them for me tonight! :-)

loves my baby bump.

There’s a strong possibility that I’ll be moving house quite soon and so I’ve decided to start celebrating Discardia a bit early this season. I’ve already made a start on cleaning out one of my boxes of stuff. I probably haven’t been as ruthless as I could have been, but the knowledge I might have to pack it all up soon has been helping. I feel lighter already.

My parents’ 40th anniversary is tomorrow. The 40th anniversary is a biggie, right? So why are there so few cards for it? And why are the cards that are available crappy ones?

Normally I buy cards at Walgreens. I don’t require fabric, ribbons, or glued-on geegaws – just something heartfelt without being cheesy. (Sometimes funny, though it seems more and more the only person I buy funny for is R.) But Walgreens had one 40th anniversary card, so I went elsewhere. Target, in fact. They had more of a selection, but nothing like I had in mind. I was also disappointed in their selection of gift wrap; the best I could find was a no-frills red paper bag – no glossy finish or even finished edges. The only cool bags were for birthdays, weddings, and baby showers…none of which had quite the tone I was going for.

So I braved the Hallmark store. That place sets my sinuses off terribly. (What is it in there that stinks so bad? And why would anyone want their homes to smell like that?) It’s so crowded with kitschy crap that you can barely find the floor, let alone the cards. You’re welcomed by a sugary-sweet, disembodied voice originating somewhere in the midst of all that kountry kouture, and end up responding to the shelving, hoping you’ve at least guessed the general direction of the girl’s location accurately.

I guess you could say I hate the Hallmark store.

Anyway, desperate for a decent card and gift bag, I resort to Hallmark. Would you believe they didn’t have much better? Nothing in the meager gift bag/wrapping paper selection worked for me, and they had a whopping three cards, all of which were awful. I finally managed to find a serviceable one behind one of those 40th Anniversary shelf tags, and swiped a correct-sized envelope from another card slot. And went back to Walgreens for a gift bag; I settled for a plain red (glossy, finished edges, but nothing special) bag and black-and-white floral tissue paper.

So, not at all what I’d had in mind. I would have settled for something mildly glittery, but all of those were birthday bags.

Do we not celebrate anniversaries anymore? I saw a few more cards for 25th and 50th, and Hallmark even had cards for each milestone, in increments of 5, from 5th to 45th. But usually only one card for each. And each store had customizable (pick the year) cards, which would have worked but felt too impersonal. I know the divorce rate is high, but doesn’t that mean we should put more effort into celebrating the ones who manage to stay married? I mean, what gives?

I know…this stuff isn’t really all that important. But my parents are not exchanging presents until they see what her insurance pays on the heart cath she had yesterday, so my present may be all they get. I want it to look good!

I shall wind up this rant now, and go wrap the present.