Twenty Five!

You know, birthdays are funny. I remember when I was younger, I would start getting excited about my birthday months before it actually happened. I would seriously lose sleep just thinking about it.

Now, not so much. I honestly hardly even noticed it approaching, until I realized with a start a few days ago that I indeed, was turning 25 in a few short days. I felt like it took me by surprise, and I felt like I wouldn't even have all that much time to celebrate it, considering I'd be in school most of the day, after having been in school for eight hours every day for the past two weeks. I was exhausted, grumpy, and not totally in a celebrating mood.

But, life has a way of showing you that you're wrong about most things. That morning, I woke up to a cheerful Evan, who had strung up some "Happy Birthday!" banners and had gotten me some beautiful flowers. He drove me to PSU that morning and I couldn't help thinking that did in fact, have the best fiance in the whole world. Here he was, supposed to be celebrating summer break and instead is getting up with me at 6:15 and driving me to class. As he dropped me off, I couldn't help feeling a little grumpy, because I would have rather spent the day at home with Evan and my flowers than be in class. At least, I thought, I was able to celebrate it a little bit this morning.

 Again, I was wrong.  I walked into room 206 on Friday, and was greeted with "Happy Birthday!" from a lot of my classmates. It meant a lot to me, because we've all grown so close. See, we're all enrolled in these week-long classes that get you three credits if you survive until Friday, but it's a lot of intense critical thinking and it's even more sitting. Eight solid hours of class, sitting in uncomfortable little desks from the 50's (the class was held in St.Mary's Academy. Let me tell you; if I was a parent paying upwards of $10,000 a year for my child's education there, I would demand slightly more ergonomic desks) will definitely bring people together.

The class was taught by an instructor that hailed from the former Soviet Union, and oh my goodness, it showed. She would start class promptly at 8:30 am, and when she gave us "free time" to discuss, she would say things like, "Okay, I will give you 15 seconds to discuss. Discuss. Okay! 15 seconds is up! Back to your seats!" Her motto was, "When I say time is up, finish your sentence, not your paragraph."

So you can imagine my fear when my friend Julie wanted to take me out to a Lebanese restaurant close to campus on my birthday. I hesitated because our instructor gave us thirty minutes for lunch, and she was spookily accurate on starting class back up as soon as those thirty minutes were over.

Anyway, Julie showed up on campus with a balloon and flowers and I just couldn't deny her invitation. We went and chowed down on some chicken shwarma, falafels, and hummus. We sat at a small table next to the window and as we caught up, we basked in the amazing sunshine that had also decided to show up on my birthday. I didn't even realize how much time had passed until I looked at my phone and saw that it was 1:13. We had been allowed out for lunch at 12:10. I'm totally going to the gulag, I thought, as I bid Julie a hasty farewell and walked as fast as my very full stomach would allow back to class.

I tried to sneak into the classroom, but of course, the doors at a Catholic high school are never oiled well, lest you be late, and the entire class turned to welcome my late, huffing and puffing arrival. I walked over to the instructor, balloon bobbing jovially next to me, and tried to explain what had happened. She cut me off, and as I was mentally preparing myself for a USSR style bashing, she said, "It's your birthday, Mariela, and your friends wanted to celebrate. It is okay with me that you are a little late," with a smile and a pat on my shoulder.

My next surprise that day came from Dimitar, an older, Bulgarian gentleman who has decided that his life's work should be teaching and had joined the BTP cohort with me. He stood to give his final presentation, took a deep breath, and said, "before I begin, I will sing a song. Please feel free to join me if you are familiar with the lyrics." Now, Dimitar is kind of a strange duck, so we were all anticipating the Bulgarian national anthem or something, but instead, he began to sing "Happy Birthday"!! I was totally surprised, and I felt myself blushing as everybody else joined in.

I'm going to try to figure out when Dimatar's birthday is so I can sing him "Happy Birthday" in Bulgarian.

After class was over, Evan picked me up and we went to Papa Hyden on NW 23rd. We lucked out and got a table outside, where we feasted on desserts (I had this amazing thing with hazelnut gelato in it) and people watching. It was nice to sit and talk and not have our conversations tinged with stress, because Evan recently found out that he got his job back (yay!) and I was done with school for the time being. I felt okay taking my time and didn't feel any of life's other petty urgencies tugging at my conscience.

Once we had had enough of dessert and pale people basking in the sun, we met my parents for dinner at Pastini and then went back home for more dessert (funfetti cake!)  and presents. I got some amazing things, but I have to say I'm most excited about the Josh Groban concert tickets! My mom and I always joked about seeing him someday, but usually ended up missing him because his tickets tend to a)sell out quickly and b)be astronomically expensive. I really can't wait to experience his concert with my mom though. It's like one of our joint dreams coming true.

I really felt so loved on my birthday, after feeling like it would simply pass me by because of everything I had going on. It was nice to finally sit back, relax, and truly enjoy my time with those who matter so very much to me. Plus, I got to eat an amazing Lebanese meal, was forgiven by the keeper of punctuality herself, and was serenaded to by a Bulgarian. Pretty awesome birthday, after all, if I do say so myself.