Happy Birthday to Me!!

Yes, today I ceased to be a 22-year-old and became a 23-year-old.  This is pretty convenient since I've been rounding myself up to 23 in my mind since January.  A friend of mine asked me how old I was in February, I told him 23, and then had to correct myself as he looked at me quizzically.  So it's nice to really be 23.

For the first day in my entire life, I had class on my birthday.  Having a summer birthday, I was always spared the misfortune of going to school on my birthday, but summer intensives kind of throw a wrench into that privilege.  So I spent my first waking hours as a 23 year-old person sitting through an unusually tedious and difficult Greek class, hopped up on precautionary Benedryl to fight against another allergy attack and with a paper cup of coffee fighting against the drowsiness created by the Benedryl.  After class, I fought through a half hour of traffic to get back to my apartment from campus (less than 2 miles away), and eventually got frustrated with Greek homework and my non-working phone interchangeably, and was generally not having a good day.

However, I wouldn't necessarily call this a bad birthday, because all the birthday parts of the day were good! For one thing, my inbox looked something like this for most of the day:

Yes, for people of the Facebook generation, birthdays make you feel really popular.  I know some people get annoyed with the clogged inbox, but I kind of like it...besides overwhelming me with the birthday love, I enjoy imagining what would happen if all those people who wished me happy birthday showed up at my door together to celebrate my birthday.  It would be quite the odd collection of people...in that screenshot alone (which represents only about a third of the birthday greetings I received) you've got college friends, grad school friends, sorority sisters, middle school friends, fellow church camp counselors, high school friends, and Paris housemates...I even got a birthday message from the French girl I did a homestay with when I visited France in high school.  I kind of love Facebook...when you're away from so many people on your birthday, it's nice to have them all thrown in your face wishing you general happiness.

I also shared a fabulous birthday dinner with some of my friends here in Dallas at Chuy's, my favorite Tex-Mex restaurant.  I'm generally not one for huge parties, and prefer just getting together with a few friends to engaging with large crowds....it also fits my current study schedule a bit better.  Happily, friends started arriving at my apartment right when I was reaching my panic point, and enchiladas with tomatillo sauce and laughter with friends effectively diffused that stress.  Also, the room we were seated in was like a shrine to Elvis, and we all found that to be hilarious...

Sarah and Rachel

Erin, Kristen, and I

The Elvis portrait above our table

So good food plus good friends always equals a good birthday.  And although my night subsequently included a ton of homework (and will continue to include some vocab flashcards after I post this), I did have a good birthday overall.

Although today's view from 23 may have seemed much like yesterday's view from 22, what with the Greek homework and broken phone and all, I know that I've grown in tremendous ways this past year.  For one thing, this time last year I had no idea that I would be in Dallas right now, and I hadn't met any of the wonderful women that I shared my birthday with today.  This year was a difficult one in many ways as I separated myself both from family and from friends who had become like family to move clear across the country to a new city and a new school.  The post-grad transition year was a lot more difficult than I expected it to be.  But I truly think that I'm more mature because of it, and have a better grasp on my goals for the future, and I'm slowly getting my Celia-tastic confident swag back after a year of feeling out of place and doubting my ability to succeed.  And that's a good feeling.

So here's to year 23!