when i was and who i am

The morning is my favorite time of day. Please don't take that to mean that I am a morning person necessarily... I find it hard to get out of bed sometimes, like many other people I know. But it seems to me that when I finally do get up, the day is worth it. That is what I always think to myself, especially on a day like today...my birthday.

 At 7:03a.m. when I pushed the covers back and let my feet hit the floor, I could already smell what was going on in the kitchen. It was a mixture of cinnamon  and fresh brewed coffee, and even though my brain was still foggy I couldn't help smiling. Wandering in with bare feet on the cold tile floor I found the culprit. Felix, my husband, was standing over the sink mixing icing in a bowl and glancing at the timer on the oven. Next to him on the counter were two steaming cups of coffee, one with milk and one without. Hearing my feet slapping the kitchen floor he looked over his shoulder and smiled at me.
"Hey gorgeous," he laughed as my disheveled head rested on his shoulder. "Good morning. Happy birthday!"
I grabbed the coffee and sat down on the stool, my arms resting on the countertop. Yes, this is the morning of my thirtieth birthday. And as that fact seemed to weigh on me the morning light changed and somehow didn't look so bright.
"Yeah, you are married to an old woman now, Prince Charming." Felix winked at me.
"Oh darling, but you are a sexy old woman...!"
The timer went off and he leaned down to open the oven, revealeing a tray of perfect cinnamon buns that were without a doubt home-made. Felix may work construction by day, but by night he is a fine cook, baker, chef...gourmet food is one of his hobbies, which has accounted for afew extra pounds over the years. Thirty years.
"Really? Honey, am I really still sexy?"
Felix heaped icing on one of the fresh cinnamon buns and transferred it to a waiting plate which was deposited in front of me. He looked me in the eyes and smiled a slow smile, the kind of smile that I usually saw when he was about to take advantage of me...
"Darling, you are as sexy as you were when we first met."

When I was twenty-two I met Felix for the first time. I had just graduated from university and was  job hunting in Dallas where my aunt and uncle lived along with my two cousins. I was staying with them and sharing a room with my cousin Krista, who was twenty-three and still living at home while she worked her way through grad school. On the third night of my stay which was also Friday night, Krista insisted that I come out with her and some friends after a rough day of two interviews and several hours of waiting, along with a parking ticket. Despite not feeling up for it I let her dress me in her cute turquoise halter top and put glitter on my eyelids, and we went. As soon as I walked in the door I felt out of place amidst a group of friends who all knew each other, so I ordered a drink and settled in at the periphery, waving at Krista with a tired smile when she looked questioningly at me.
Felix caught my eye after about ten minutes, as he was talking with one of Krista's friends and I watched the exchange as he gestured over to me and Krista smiled and leaned in to say something in his ear. Before I knew it he had walked over and settled himself next to me, beer in hand, with a very charming smile and began a freindly conversation that instantly made me feel at ease and by the end of the night I was glad that Krista had made me come and made me wear the turquoise halter top, which really was kind of sexy. While I didn't get the a job in Dallas and left two days later, I did get Felix's number and we started talking. Two months later he showed up at my internship at the end of the day with flowers in hand and asked if I wouldn't mind dating him. I said yes, even though he was a year younger than me and still finishing his last year at trade school and lived in Dallas. When he finished trade school he moved up to Madison. We moved in together. A year later, almost two years after we met, we got married. I was twenty-four, and he was twenty-three.

Putting on my make-up later I couldn't help but think about twenty-four. Here I am, six years later, and oh, how things have changed. When I was twenty-four I had Miss Helmund as my agent in Madison. Every week I would sit down and pound out at least one short story, and send it to Miss Helmund who would then send it on to some publisher or if she thought it was more of a mass audience piece would send it to a magazine or paper. I had gotten my Converse-clad foot in the door of the publishing world, and I still dreamed dreams of writing the new great American novel and moving to a beach house in South Carolina, far away from Wisconsin winters, where I would surely have much more inspirtation and definately better weather. Miss Helmund, while always encouraging, never quite got me there. She eventually retired from being an agent, and I never got the chance to ask her why despite being sixty-four she still went by "miss." Long story short I never found another agent like her, and so I just stopped looking and my writing slowed as consequence. I got a real job, and my life streamed on, farther away from the new great American novel. Dreams.
I grabbed my coat on the way the the garage, steeling myself for the February chill in the northern Wisconsin air, a mug of coffee clutched in one gloved hand and car keys in the other. Felix kissed me on the way out.
"So see you tonight? I checked everything yesterday and we are good to go."
"Yes, sounds good. I should be home around six."
"What? Can't you get off earlier? The reservation is at seven, remember, and we have to drive there, and..."
"Felix, honey, I will try to get out earlier but I can't promise anything. With the developments in the Art Department over the last two days things are getting crazy." Felix raised an eyebrow at me, with an expectant look. "But..." I bit my lip and then let out a sigh.  "I really will do my best."
"Ok, darling. I just want to do something nice on your birthday..."
I opened the garage door and felt the icy wind blow in around my ankles. I put my coffee in the cup holder and smiled at Felix with my most winning smile before getting into the car.
"Thanks, honey. I will see you later tonight."

The roads were not really so bad this morning, despite the snowfall last night. My favorite U2 song came on the radio, which I took to be a good omen for my brithday and as I waited at the last red light before my building I sipped coffee and continued to remember. Something nice for my brithday....

The nicest birthday I ever had was probably my eighteenth. It was my senior year of high school, the last birthday I spent with both of my parents, and I got the best gift and had the best time.
The morning of I woke up to my Dad bringing me breakfast in bed. It was a Friday, I remember, because my grandma was coming the following day and my cousins too since they hadn't yet moved to Texas, and we were going to have a big family party with everyone.
"Happy Birthday, favorite daughter!" Dad sat down on the side of my bed and waited as I rubbed my eyes and sat up in bed, pushing my pillows back.
"Dad, what is this? Did you really make me your famous blueberry pancakes? Blueberries aren't even in season...!" But there they were, perfectly round and steaming right under my nose with some scrambled eggs and orange juice and the perfect drizzle of syrup, just the way I liked it, not so much that the páncakes were soaking but enough so that it soaked into the pancake instead of drowning it. To complete the tray there was a lone pink rose in a glass of water...my mother's touch, and my favorite flower. Mom poked her head into the room and grinned at me. Dad patted my knee.
"It's your birthday, sweetie. And you only turn eighteen once." He kissed me on the cheek and wrapped me in a flannel hug that smelled like sawdust from his shop and aftershave. Mom came in and smiled at me, holding out a plain envelope with my name on it in her perfect cursive.
"Here, sweetie, this is part of your gift. So you can start to plan your day." I looked up at her puzzled, and took the envelope, opening it and catching my breath. In my hands were two tickets to the U2 concert that was downtown that night.
"MOM!" I screamed and almost upset my breakfast tray, my face practically splitting open my smile was so big. "How did you get these????? And it's tonight????? Are you SERIOUS??!" Mom laughed and kissed me on the cheek.
"Like you Dad said, baby girl, you only turn eighteen once. Take Alexa with you tonight and have fun."
The rest of the day I spent on Cloud Nine, and upon arriving to school I immediately began planning my evening with Alexa, my best friend since third grade and fellow U2 super fan. She was more rock and rebel than I was, with her artistic mother and step-father, and had spent  seventh grade living in Spain with her real father and going to school there, and she often helped me with Spanish homework and constantly introduced me to new music of the obscure but excellent kind, while cultivating my love of classic rock and oldies but also insisting that I listen to opera and dismaying that I could not "feel the story in the music." She had recently convinced me to go out for the school paper and regularly took me along with her on "assignments" that involved covering local music events and sometimes the occasional Latino event. Thanks to Alexa the writing bug got hold of me and my music tastes have over time become varied and objective enough to make me predisposed to give pretty much anything a listen. She had turned eighteen herself just last month and already had a tattoo to show for it, along with bleached blonde hair.
"Oh God, this is the best gift EVER. Your parents really went all out!!!! This is amazing!" I had just shown her the tickets and informed her that all evening plans she had would have to be cancelled. "Girlfriend, YOU are my evening plan!" She giggled and threw an arm around my shoulder as the bell rang and we made our way to biology class. The day was spent passing notes between classes and with many friendly birthday wishes, and that night we spent at least an hour picking out our clothes and then talking baout nothing but the band while we drove there, with extra money in the dash for food and parking. We got into the concert and screamed along with thousnads of other fans as song after classic song played, and when the lights and speakers finally went out our ears were ringing and we could barely understand each other we were so hoarse. We made our way back to the car in the crowded lot discussing the perks and downfalls of being a groupie/journalist/song writer. We agreed that we would start an alternative music magazine which would eventually rival Rolling Stone, and travel the world together going to music festivals and promoting promising bands and being chief editors, of course. That night, when eighteen years made the world seem bright and made everything seem possible, was one of the highlights of my life and without a doubt my best birthday, ever. Since then I have had "nice" birthdays, but never anything quite on the same level. Certainly turning thirty was not going to be as great as turning eighteen.

The headquarters of the Bad Bone were already bustling when I arrived. While it was not the dream job Alexa and I had envisioned at eighteen, being assistant editor of a pet magazine is not so bad. But people are usually surprised to find out that I do not have a pet...just a lot of editing experience.
My mailbox outside my office was full of the usual...rough drafts and advertisements and memos, along with a surprising bag full of my favorite blueberry cake donughts. I glanced around the room and caught a certain brunette head peeking over her cubicle at me. Maureen, my close friend from marketing waved at me and gave me a thumbs up before ducking back down to her desk. I smiled and unlocked my door balancing coffee and the bag of doughnuts in one hand, with the rest of my mail tucked under one arm.
By lunch I had cleared my inbox and sent off messages to several co-workers, edited a few of the rough drafts left to me and had gotten an update on the art deptartment crisis from the editor in chief, my boss, Maxwell Larssen. Apparently Ben Wiegand who was one of the top illustrators was having some sort of personal issue and it was holding up production in a major way. At 1:18p.m. I finally slowed down and sent Maureen a message to meet for lunch.
We sat in the cafeteria on the first floor of the building, me with a salad and Maureen with some left over casserole and green beans. Occassionally we were interrupted as people passed by and said Happy Birthday, and I smiled and politely thanks them all the while wondering if I had smile lines...when people turn thirty they always seemed to suddenly have more wrinkles, and I kept crossing my fingers that they were at least smile lines. Halfway through my salad Maureen brought up the gossip.
"So Wiegand," she began, her volume dropping. "Just found out his girlfriend is pregnant. I bet that is part of why he is freaking out."
"Really." I moved a piece of tomato around on my plate before spearing it and a cucumber. "Well, that is a pretty big development."
"I know..." Maureen shook her head slightly, leaning away from her tupperware. "I mean, I can't even fathom having kids with Jeff, you know? Our world would pretty much end. And I don't know that I even want to be a mom."
Maureen, despite being fabulous at multitasking and finding new marketing opportunities, as well as having the most upbeat personality and one of the sharpest senses of humor I have ever encountered, is not the most attractive of women. She has crazy curly brown hair and is overweight, and usually wears headbands that are actually folded bandanas along with black Birkenstock clogs and no makeup except for mascara. Her nose, which was broken at the tender age of eleven in a bike accident, is slightly crooked and doesn't fit the rest of her face. What makes Maureen beautiful is who she is...and Jeff, her boyfriend of five months, sees her. I could not imagine them having kids either, especially not after five months. And after a long pause, Maureen's comment about motherhood threw me back into remembering.

After three years of marriage and several years of birth control, Felix and I decided we wanted to have a family. At twenty-seven I was a healthy young woman, a regular gym-goer and the delicious food my husband spoiled me with had not yet settled on my hips. Consulting with both my regular doctor and a gynecologist I went off birth control and Felix and I continued with our regular romps, excited by the fact that the encounters might now bear fruit. I got a few library books about fertility and looked up information about child development, waiting for my period and being even more mindful about my body. But nothing changed, nothing happened...for months my period came regularly, and each time it did I felt a stab of dissapointment. Finally my gynecologist suggested some Natural Family Planning methods as well as an exam for both of us. But everything was functioning normally, and after three months of making the most of my fertile days, nothing had happened and...I gave up.
Felix came home late one evening to find me curled up on the couch with a pint of ice cream watching The Notebook, and when our eyes met I started crying. He dropped his tools and came around to me, taking the ice cream out of my hands and wrapping me a hug that smelled like sweat and dust and cut grass. I continued to cry even though I noticed that his shirt was so dusty that it was staining my white top. But it was an insignificant detail, compared to the knowlege that I was twenty seven years old and apparently as barren as the Sahara.
"My darling," he whispered into my hair with his muscular arms around me. "Please don't be sad."
"But, honey," I gasped, wiping my nose with the back of my hand. "We will never have a family. I can't give you kids..." And on the word 'kids' my body started trembling again. Felix pulled me into his lap then, and kissed my forehead before wrapping me up in his dusty embrace.
"Listen to me." His voice was soft but commanding, and I took a deep breath and tried to stop the flood. "YOU are my family. And when we got married we both agreed that we maybe wanted kids. Please," he cupped my face in his rough hands and his eyes looked deeply into mine. "Do not blame yourself. Maybe it is my fault. Maybe it's neither of us. Maybe we are just not meant to be parents. And if that is how our lives are going to be, then ok. I will have you all to myself."
"Oh, Felix..."
"Really, darling. I mean it. You are all I need. You are my family. You are enough."
That night Felix was tender with me, and as I thought on his words I felt calm seeping into my dissapointed heart. When I was twenty-seven I had known that YES, I wanted to be a mom. And I had learned to accept that I would never be...and listening to Maureen's doubts and living the memories all over again, I had a growing sympathy for Ben Wiegand. The things we never know we wanted, until it's too late...

By the end of the day there were rumors flying fast about the situation in the art department, and my boss's stress level had risen to boiling point with the still unfinished illustrations for the next issue, which was scheduled to be printed this weekend. By 4:57 p.m. I knew that I would never make it home by six. But I still held off calling Felix to tell him that. While I hung in the doorway and tried to soothe Mr. Larssen there was a sudden commotion at the end of the hallway and the stairwell burst open, with Ben Wiegand tumbling out, followed closely by the Art Director Lisa who was shouting shrilly at him to 'stop this nonsense and get back to his desk.' But Ben Wiegand walked purposefully down the hallway, eyes ablaze and stopped right in front of the editor's door where I was standing. Pushing me gently aside he stood defiantly in Mr. Larssen's office and clenched his fists. Lisa the Art Director teetered to a halt beside me in her neat black heels, breathless with eyes wide and furious.
"Mr. Larssen, sir, I really must apologize--" she began but Larssen held up a hand to silence her and focused on Wiegand.
"What is going on here?" he said quietly, and Ben Wiegand took a deep breath before closing his eyes and answering.
"Mr. Larssen, with all due respect, Bad Bone is a pretty good magazine. I have worked here for the last seven years and I've learned a lot, had some great opportunities, really enjoyed the people I have worked with. BUT" here he paused and took anothe deep breath, and I could see his shoulders tense. "This is not what I want to do with my life. I cannot spend the rest of my days drawing stupid cartoon dogs and hoping that something better will come along and find me. I am already thirty-seven years old and I am not getting any younger."
In my head my basic math skills informed me that if Ben Wiegand was thirty-seven and had been working at Bad Bone for seven years, then he had been thirty when he first started working here. Thirty...like me.
"I just found out a few days ago that my girlfriend is pregnant. Do you have kids, Mr. Larssen?" The editor nodded slowly but did not say anything, giving Ben the chance to continue. "My life is about to change. I want to give my kid the best of everything. I am going to ask my girlfriend to marry me. And I am not going to keep drawing stupid cartoon dogs."
By now, all of the floor had gone quiet and everyone waqs peeking over the top of thier cubicle. I saw Maureen's curly brown head among them, listening raptly to this man pour out his soul.
"When I was young, I wanted to be an illustrator of children's books. I had dreams, I had passion, I had drive. Somehow it went out, it faded away, but now it is back I know that I can make things happen, that I can do what I always wanted to do. I have to follow my dream. And that dream is not here at Bad Bone."
As I listened to Ben Wiegand's words my memories and thoughts compiled over the course of the day seemed to all wash through my mind together, and I felt instinctively what was happening to Ben Wiegand. I knew what he meant about not following dreams and I knew exactly how his dreams and passion had faded away, because that is what had happened to me too. When I was eighteen it happened, losing my best friend after going to college and forgetting our dream. It happened when I was twenty-four, losing my agent and letting my passion simmer down. It happened when I was twenty-seven, and despaired that I would never have children. What, what would I say, I wondered, about my thirtieth year? Would I let something else go by the wayside? Would I stay here and drift farther away from my dreams?
I didn't care for dogs. My passion was writing and music, not editing and managing. All my life I had dreamed of living on a beach and finding inspiration, not in Wisconsin living in monotone. Ben Wiegand seemed to have reached down and tugged on something in my heart....
"Mr. Larssen," Wiegand's voice was quiet and solemn and sorry. "I quit."
He turned on his heel in the silence that followed and made his unhurried way to the door, brushing past me and Lisa the Art Director, then pausing and turning back to look me in the eye and say with a genuine smile,
"Happy birthday, by the way."
As the elevator closed behind him the office seemed to errupt with activity and noise as people started moving and talking again, but Mr. Larssen and I were the only ones who stood quietly for a moment more in thought before joining the chaos.

That afternoon Mr. Larssen told me to go home at 5:20 p.m. He and I were up to our eyebrows in old copy with Lisa, trying to find appropritate art for the next edition before midnight and he turned to me and insisted that I go home.
"After all, it's your birthday today. You only turn thirty once." I did not ask how he knew that I was thirty...I simply took advantage of the early dismissal and grabbing my coat and purse from my office headed for the elevator, blowing an envious Maureen a kiss on my way.
When I got home at 5:40 p.m. Felix was already there, freshly showered and putting on one of the three button down oxford shirts he owned, hair slicked back with water and smelling of the cologne I had just gotten him for Christmas.
"Honey," I said to him, wrappping my arms around his waist. "You look amazing." He laughed and shook me off, going to the closet to pick one of his five ties and going to the bathroom mirror with a determined look.
"Well my darling, you need to get yourself ready as well. You need to look amazing for your birthday dinner tonight." I smiled at him and put my purse down, starting to undress and watching him with delight as his eyes strayed from his tie to watch me.