Birthday thoughts

And here it is: the 12th anniversary of my 29th birthday!  It's been a surprising day (two days).

Longtime readers may remember that my last few birthday posts have been quite grim.  Last year I was stoked to have my 40th birthday ignored.  The year before that I was a ball of loathing and depression.  The entries for 2013 and 2012 were clearly written in a haze of red wine and antidepressants.  Anyway, I was expecting to gloom my way through this birthday too, until yesterday when N., who manages the front desk, asked me what sort of cake the firm should order.  It's the custom for the firm to buy a cake to share from the Cheesecake Shop.Declining it was actually an option, and I'd expected myself to do so.  And when I was asked, it struck me that this would be appallingly churlish.  After all, everyone at the firm has made me welcome.  The boss and his wife could not have been friendlier.  To reject an offer of hospitality would have been positively unpleasant on my part.

In case you were wondering what I went with! (Image from here)

Besides which, I didn't want to.  For the first time in a long, long, long time I feel good about myself and my life.  I have a job which I enjoy, even on the more challenging days and where I get to work on interesting files  with a great team.  As I look at the twenty-somethings I work with, I can understand why P (a very talented lawyer I know who is in his late sixties) so enjoys working with trainees and early-career solicitors.  Their energy is infectious, and it feels pretty good to be able to help them put a lawyerly edge on their skills.  Outside of work, things are going well with SES.  I seems to be well liked within the unit and to have a useful contribution to make.

And away from work?  I live in one room of a rooming house.  To be honest, that's enough for me.  My wants are fairly simple and the way I live also allows me to have a lot of the solitude that I want and need.  It mightn't be everybody's preferred way to live, but it's mine and I like it.  I have enough time to run and keep fit, to do the things I like, and can keep to myself when I wish to.

There are a few bugs of course.  I do still have the not-really-welcome feeling of drifting in life and being frightened that one day I'll wake up and be old.  And unemployment is a fear that never really leaves you once you've been out of work for a long time.  But overall I have much to be grateful for.

It seems the universe felt the same way, since yesterday it gave me a bumper harvest of things that I enjoy.  I know that last sentence will make the rest of this sound appallingly aren't-I-a-good-guy, but it's really not meant to.  Anyway, yesterday kicked off with a blood bank appointment at 0715.  Plasma, as usual, with a muffin and sausage roll for breakfast afterwards.  What's not to like?

Donating Plasma - City Blood Bank

The day itself was about what you'd expect: a couple of clients and trying to assemble a brief and court book in an upcoming matter.  About 1400 I was asked if I could travel to a rural SES unit that had been to a rather nasty accident to provide peer support that evening.  I was happy to do so and scurried home after work to drive up there, a bit over an hour away.  These were people I know well and so being able to lend a hand was a good feeling.  My pager kept buzzing all through the session, however, because a heavy rain dump was smashing my own unit's area.

Requests for assistance were still coming in when I got back to town about 2230 and so I asked the UDO if he needed another pair of hands.  As it turned out, that was enough to allow a relief crew to be formed so the one then in the field could be recalled  and sent home, with us sent out in its place.  The callouts all related to water entering people's houses, rather than room damage itself.  In each case there was at least something we could do to improve the situation.

We were finally clear by about 0200 and I gratefully collapsed into bed at 0315.

Three different aspects of doing what I love in one day?  That's a pretty good way to lead into a new year of my life.