One very fun thing about the Christmas season is that it includes my birthday. Not that birthdays in and of themselves are causes for extreme celebration. My grands look forward to birthdays, especially landmark birthdays. My next landmark birthday will be in four years and I will be 70. My grandmother was 70. Our elderly neighbor during my elementary years was 70. I will not look forward with great anticipation to turning 70 except, as they say, that it’s better than the alternative. Plus both my husband and my sister Bec will always be older than me. Neener, neener.  I’ll leave the birthday joy to my grandkids.

What is joyful, however, is that my good friends, who I might go months without seeing, faithfully contact me the week or so before my birthday to celebrate with me. Can you fit in breakfast or lunch or a happy hour during this busy birthday week, they ask me.

The fact of the matter is that when I looked at my calendar on Sunday, there was nothing but blanks on each day, except for a lonely doctor’s appointment. Yes, friends, I have nothing but time.

Last night I took light rail downtown to experience a hip and very cool happy hour at a hip and very cool lounge in a hip and very cool small hotel. My walk to the hotel included slipping on black ice twice (catching myself before I landed on my but-tox both times), and getting harassed by three young women who insisted on walking with me for a block or so, and then suggesting that I might want to give them my phone so that they could take a picture of me. Other than that, I enjoyed my time very much.

By the way, I declined the young women’s offer of the photo session. Boy, would they have been surprised to see my ancient iPhone 7 instead of the hip and cool iPhone 11 they (maybe) wanted to steal. Perhaps if they had been able to time the photo to the exact moment when I was falling on my butt, it might have made for a great photo. But I think I would have been able to catch them after they nabbed my phone because, though I was the one who nearly fell down and broke her crown, they were wearing high heels.

On Friday morning, I am going to breakfast with a friend at a considerably less hip and cool restaurant where the owners are Greek and the food is plentiful and delicious. My meal will not include the martini that last night’s social event did. No matter. I’m very excited.

People often tell me they think it must be sad to have a birthday smack dab in the middle of Christmas chaos. Au contraire, I always respond. I pretend the decorations are for me! When I was little, I discovered that while Christmas shopping, people often purchased a little something for Kris’ birthday. That’s a big win for a kid. My favorite gift as a child, by the way, was a set of plastic wigs — blonde, brunette, and redhead — that I received from my godmother. Now they are referred to as rare and vintage.

As am I.