Turning 21... Yet Again

I usually celebrate my birthdays with lots of booze at a bar with a bunch of friends - but this year... this year will be different. Don't get me wrong I will still be drinking it up at some point next week in honor of my big two-five, but the day of the anniversary of my twenty-first birthday will be spent at a classy, quaint restaurant with my rents. They are flying in all the way from Philadelphia to spend the weekend with me and I cannot relay how much I appreciate that gesture.

When I lived with them, there were many of times that we didn't get along, although I never lost the sense of how lucky I was to have parents like them. They have always been there for me, through my awkward teenage years, through my trials and tribulations of college, through my stupid alcohol induced car crash a few years back, through the biggest heartbreak of my life, through my journey through grad school. I could always count on finding peace and understanding in that little house at the intersection or R Street and J Street in Northeast Philly suburbia - no matter how many miles separated me from the place I will always call home.

Sure, ideally I'd like there to be a special guy to surprise me with flowers, take me out to a lovely dinner, and do the whole birthday wine-and-dine thing. However, I feel that if I was in a relationship I wouldn't have been able to achieve what I have thus far in my life. And though love is important, I am patient enough to wait for it. As long as it takes, baby, I will be here.