Ten years ago, my good friends threw me a 30th birthday party where several of them had volunteered to prepare songs for me beforehand. Most of them were parodies -- other renditions of everything from musicals to the Beastie Boys with lyrics in my honor. Some who couldn't be there even contributed by video. I had just gotten really into DJ-ing, and the party was themed as such. My guest of honor accessory was a giant record and a silly paper crown. It was perfect, and friends I hadn't seen in years participated.
I couldn't have known that in just two years, one of my guests would be killed in a car accident with her son on New Year's Day. Or that a couple of years after that, another close friend would be taken by cancer. If you had told me at that birthday party what was to come -- a decade containing the most difficult events and lessons of my life, I certainly wouldn't have wanted to keep going. I'm not married, I have no children. Some dreams are even still deferred. And here I am, ten years later on my 40th birthday, working long hours, and with a boyfriend sick in bed with the one summer cold.
But this is 40. In an odd way, there's something perfect about the imperfectness of today. The reality of obligations and the unpredictable, non-me-ness of life are more real than ever at this age. My birthday has always been a sensitive day for me, the one day I could just think about me and what I wanted to do, and feel okay about that. But today's reality was setting in -- boyfriend illness, dinner plans cancelled, work escalating yet again -- the world doesn't stop for me, and it never really has. But I knew one thing would still be true: The Lord rejoices over me. He rejoices over this day he created me, knowing the years of joy and suffering that would finally lead me to that place of confidence in his unshakeable, unconditional love. That, too, came with the chrysalis of the last 10 years, and my 30-year-old self just wouldn't have gotten it.
So this birthday, toiling at meaningless work, is imperfect. But I have a God with perfect love for me. That truth hit me with tears this morning, and I can truly say that's enough.
