An English Garden Birthday, Parte la Premiere

[At this point, the idea of a big, booze-infused birthday bash is actually repellent, but the idea of lots of anniversaire attention isn't. My solution: plant lots of seeds, reminding diverse populations of the upcoming date, and see what blooms. The result is a nice, haphazard English garden of low-key recognition the creates an all-day minor buzz. Eminently preferable to the climactic blowouts of my 20s that used to leave me both depressed about being a year older AND desperately hung over.]

[(If this seems to you like a lot of energy to spend in pursuit of a basically selfish and silly goal, you're not wrong. But I remember being shocked by how hurt I was the year I thought no one local remembered my birthday, and while I deplore my tactics, even I can read wall-writing this big.)]

[The summary: got up early, gave myself the gift of four loads of clean laundry. (Omitted the gift of folding it; tonight, maybe.) Went to work, where it's been terminally slow, so shot lots of silly shit with the new officemate, Alex. In the middle of the afternoon, Allen schlumped into the Cute Vic, and I made him take me to Foley's ("Time For A Pint!"), where the adorable Irish bartender C. (gay, but married; bleah) plied us with spirits until it was time for me to slosh back to work. (Yes, I can work tipsy - it's an essential, if rarely exercised, skill.)]

[The rest of work was effortless and seemed to float by; why would that be? (This isn't much of a "summary," is it?) The rest of the evening was an agreeably pixillated outing at Martuni's, then Zeitgeist, a boite I'd never visited in almost nine years of haunting the Valencia/Duboce part of the beautiful green forest. (Read about it elsewhere if interested; I'll only add that I was surprised at the size of the adjoining yard, which held a couple of hundred chilly revelers under tantalizing barbecue smoke.) (I'll also add that it says something that, of the three bars I visited this birthday (four, if you count the FNC), I wouldn't hesitate to take my parents to any of them; in fact they've been to two of the four.)]

[Nothing crazy, and I was home and in bed before 1 AM. No hangover, and I met some new, fun people who I may never see again, one of whom kissed me. (His subsequent nickname: the Gecko.) Tomorrow's dinner with the family and a couple of friends in Sonoma. See? Low key, but memorable. Life's secret may continue to elude, but I'm finally figuring out how to have a satisfactory birthday.]

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