PA trip

This time last night we were just heading out of PA and homeward bound. Reading my last post I had to smile since once again we had an abbreviated weekend trip to PA! Some days I feel like there are just not enough hours in the day for all the life lessons coming my way right now. And I wanted to spend some time writing on my 30th birthday and have less than an hour of it left!! So a quick blog entry will have to do.

To make a long story short, we had a wonderful time with wonderful friends Friday evening and all day Saturday before coming home, arriving at 2am this morning. I've been journeying with a woman in the graduate program I work with who was expecting a little boy at the beginning of October and who I had agreed to accompany during the birth. He decided to come early and was born Saturday afternoon while we were still in PA. He is precious and healthy and is being warmly received and welcomed by our students from all over the world. It is an amazing thing to be part of, even as I can't help but experience some disappointment at missing his grand entrance.

The process of deciding when or if we should leave PA was actually a weighty one for me, layered with some of the ongoing complexity I feel as I tease out my home and family life and my work and community life. Striking a healthy and sustainable balance is not an overnight task. So I've added that to my list for my 31st year!

Every birthday has some firsts I imagine. This year had some that welcome and some that are painful. But Kali was so full of life and fun today, a wonderfully special gift. And today the most memorable first for me was getting a foot massage from Kali with the purple lotion and foot scrubber she picked out for my birthday. Of course, as she does everything, she had to do it in a manner outside the box. It was foot scrub, then a leg scrub, then a pant scrub. But I felt loved none-the-less!

Now, as I do every year, I'll pass the birthday celebrating to Jason! We all agreed to go ahead and cut into the funny cake pie today while it is was fresh but there is enough to enjoy tomorrow as well. Jason and I are hoping to get up early enough to enjoy a cup of coffee together on our porch before Kali is up and ready to go, go, go... It's likely to be possible as it looks like she might want to be the first one to wish her daddy a Happy Birthday at midnight!

(I should give Kali credit here for the photo of J and I. She is becoming quite the photographer!!)