Tomorrow I turn 37 years old. Sort of a strange birthday.  36 feels functionally like 31, whereas 37 feels like I’m entering the twilight zone. My 36th year changed me. The birth of my daughter, Inge, turned my life upside down and I’m only just now able to appreciate what a cosmic blessing that little lady has been.   As these words leave my fingertips I can hardly comprehend that they are mine.  I have a daughter.  I never would have believed it.  But here I am, about to turn 37, plausibly half way through with my life.  And I have a spirited little daughter.

I think that bringing a life into this world is a lot to get your head around these days.  There’s trump, isis, police brutality, climate change, COVID, black witch moths! The world is a hot mess right now (literally, circling back to climate change…).  What will it be like to raise a tiny human under these circumstances?  On the other hand, in our little neck of the woods, she gets to dip her feet in the streams running through our property, explore the garden, see the turquoise of high mountain lakes, say goodnight to a fourteen thousand foot peak.  

I really liked my pre-child life and self, and didn’t particularly want to change. But I guess that’s the thing about change.  I thought that I would have a child and then steadfastly cling to the life and activities I upheld beforehand.  And in some ways I think that is important.  I’m still me, after all.  However, there were probably a few things about my life– habits, patterns, etc– that needed disruption.  And having a baby was a real catalyst for some positive change.

This was also the year that my relationship became a marriage.  In September we celebrated our first wedding anniversary, and to that point things were pretty idyllic.  Since then we’ve actually had to weather some things together.  Moving, changing jobs, pregnancy, postpartum depression, injury, covid-19.  On the one hand, it would. have been nice to continue in our state of bliss, but on the other hand the hardship we have endured this year has allowed us to get to develop a more intimate bond.

So, my thirty sixth year was eventful and… A LOT TO TAKE IN.  Onward.