Sing and Blow!

Birthday season has begun. Today my 14 yo becomes a 15yo. There is raucous, pizza-fueled laughter echoing up from the basement family room. Fifteen year old boys make noise, I know there are only four of them down there but it sounds like at least a dozen. Six weeks from today is my birthday and my older son's birthday falls in between. Some years I have put up the birthday banners and flags and left them up for the entire seven weeks. The birthday season has been abbreviated by one week since my former husband moved out, his birthday was one week ago. So it's six weeks til the Big 5-Oh Birthday Fairy shows up to wallop me with her wand. I am planning a completely lazy day for my fiftieth. I have already requested the day off work so I can sleep as late as I want, brew some excellent coffee, and maybe eat chocolate for breakfast. I selfishly want the day all to myself to do as I please and contemplate the state of my life at this midpoint. I plan to celebrate, of course, but one month early. My actual birthday falls between Independence Day and the weekend of the local arts festival, inconveniently drawing away potential party guests. My fortieth birthday party was one month late for other reasons. We had completed an addition to our home but the yard was a muddy mess and there were no steps across the two foot wide, six foot deep chasm between the patio doors and the backyard deck. Since we were serving alcohol, we thought it best to complete the steps project lest a hearty partier should fall to the landscape rocks below. And sue us or something. Since projects almost always take longer than anticipated, my birthday party was delayed for a month. I figure there's no harm in making that up now. Today's title comes from my brilliant younger son, who at the tender age of three came up with that reference for a birthday celebration. He observed that his favorite portion of the party, the consumption of cake and ice cream, came immediately after the strange custom of singing the birthday song and blowing out the candles. Hence, sing and blow. There are numerous family members and friends who have come to refer to birthdays as so-and-so's sing and blow. To outsiders it sounds a little odd. Those who don't ask what we mean undoubtedly envision a much weirder activity. I'm looking forward rather gleefully to my fiftieth sing and blow. Last year at my forty-ninth, Anna's daughter Katie insisted that there be that precise number of candles on my German Chocolate cake. I deftly blew every single one of them out without singeing a single eyebrow hair. The ensuing cloud of smoke that engulfed their dining room nearly set off the smoke alarm. Guess I'll have to blow harder this year. Come to think of it, my wish from last year hasn't come true yet. I do still have six weeks. And it's a blue moon month. Nearly a year ago I saw a bumper sticker that read, the Goddess is alive and Magick is afoot. I'm certain she's contemplating my birthday wish, she's just taking her own sweet time granting it. When you're the Goddess, you can do that.