Springing Into Action

Well, I've tentatively sketched out my birthday plan. It's on 2nd May but I'm going to have the party on 30th April. A Saturday. If the weather is good I will have a BBQ at my folks place as they will be on holiday in Lanzarote. I will have to help my dad rebuild the gazebo and wait until the last minute for preparation. If I awake on Saturday and the weather is good then it'll be a rush out to buy burgers and sausages, baps and rolls, dressings and salads. If not then I will muster the troops and play pool in the afternoon before the drunken onslaught of a party at my place.
I still look forward to my birthday. I know a few people my age who don't look forward to it but it's a missed opportunity if you don't celebrate. It was my dads 62nd birthday last month and I asked him what he would be doing. He told me he was just glad to be there, that it was celebration enough. In some way he is correct but the fact that he is there is worth celebrating and I appreciate that I still have my parents and they are both in good health.

Today also felt like the first day of spring and I'm not the first person to notice the subtle changes. I read James Lileks bleat every morning:

"The world was made for days like these – not for grim brittle winter or the elderly decreptitudes of fall, or the drone of another summer afternoon, but this: everything fresh and new and warm again. It wakes, it breaths, it grows again. You weren’t owed this; it’s not a debt you’re collecting, a gift that’s overdue, a marker you won in a game. It’s the ordinary yearly miracle."

It's certainly the spring/summer period that I enjoy the most. The late balmy evenings, sitting outside with friends, breathing in the scent of the air and soaking up the atmosphere, knowing that this perfect moment created in your head will soon dissipate leaving only the memory. But what a memory.

See you tomorrow for more.