your real thank you note is in the mail

I don't need to tell you [again] how much I love birthdays. It goes without saying that birthday week is one of my favorite times of the year. This year was no exception. I am having a great birthday week.

Another thing I love about my life at present is that I am known. I am known to the very depths and core of my being and that, that is a simultaneously terrifying and beautiful thing. I believed for a while the lie that if people knew me, they wouldn't like what they saw. They would reject and point and laugh and leave. But this week as people I love loved me in birthday ways, I realized that that scary fear is no longer a fear. It's a reality. A lovely one, at that.

The proof is in the pudding, as they say:

a surprise over breakfast tacos; a pink & purple cake with cream cheese frosting; a statue of a hand making the rock out sign; going to see my favorite band with favorite people; handcrafted cards and other handcrafted items; a ticket to a high school musical; my favorite book, fancily bound; a [big-ass] book of crafts; an art-capade; the perfect StoryPeople print; relief for the dire straights that are my finances; a movie about Unicorns; THIS; words of affirmation all over my Facebook; and quality time with so many people I love so much.

Some of those things are basic, perhaps, but others of them are not necessarily what you would call normal. I don't know that all of you would like a statue of a hand for your home or a movie about Unicorns or to go see a high school play. Which is why I call that list - perfectly crafted to somehow meet my every need and desire - perfectly delicious proof of how I am known and loved.

I don't mean to sound braggy, but honestly, I feel a little braggy.

And to those of you who know me, who know my crazy and my ugly and my broken and who have stuck around to love me, you should know that you are by far my most prized gift. Even better than that video of the Unicorn puppet singing Michael Bolton. Which is saying something.