Movable Feasts

We get so tied up in marking 'special' days that we forget that we can celebrate any day, we can be grateful every day.

The morning of my 16th birthday, my mother announced that I would be washing the floor that day.  I objected - it was my 'sweet 16 birthday'!  "The floor still needs to be washed."

I washed it, with bad grace to be  honest, fuming all the while.

When she came home from work, it was with a bouquet of flowers and a gift.  It was a lesson that took a while to settle but I did learn it.  Just because of a societal 'special' day didn't mean that life didn't go on.  And that dirty floors didn't still needed washing.

Doug and I both had jobs where travel was involved for much of our lives.  One or other of us was frequently away for birthdays or anniversaries.  My mother was stoical about when we would have birthday/anniversary dinners.  She also knew that celebrations were movable.  The calendar was just a place to mark time and time is a construct.  The days we actually got together were far more important than which day that happened.

So neither of us are particularly bothered that we 'missed' his birthday or that we will 'miss' our anniversary (or my birthday, come to that).  Because we haven't 'missed' anything, just not taken the chance to mark it beyond noticing the date.

I try every day to notice the little things and not get too bent out of shape about what society considers the big things.  A marriage is not the wedding date, but living together every day.  A birthday is just one day in a - hopefully - long string of days.  Another trip round the sun.

Facebook notifies me of people in my friends list who are having a birthday.  If I say anything at all, I send a message saying "Have a happy!"   Because I don't want people to just be happy on their birthday, but every day.  People aren't always happy all the time, even on a birthday.  It's ok to be sad.  It's ok to grieve.  It is also ok to find a tiny nugget of happiness during sad/stressful/traumatic times.

I feel like there should be an Ophrah gif - You have a happy!  And you have a happy!  Everyone gets a happy!

Have a happy y'all.