Is it possible to be spoiled with too much affection? Does kindness really kill? I was the fifth child in the family after a gap of 7 years between me and the previously youngest member of the family. My parents carefully had a child every two years and then, I think, they quit. Until I came along. My mom turned forty the year I was born. I am pretty sure I was not a planned baby. I have been told that my aunts, my mom’s sisters, tut-tutted that she was having another baby at that stage of her life. And I can only guess that my mom probably agreed with them. Who wants a fifth child when you already have a perfectly balanced family of two boys and two girls? But in those ancient days, when I was born, alternatives were not readily available and so here I am. And yesterday I turned 70.
Birthdays have always been big with me. I think we should celebrate our age. We should mark another year accomplished and a new one to anticipate. Birthdays are a good time to take stock and set intentions. I know lots of people see it as ‘just another day’ and in reality it is but I like to hold it as a milestone day, a watershed day, a day to be grateful for life. It has also been a day when I have begged for, pleaded for, and demanded lots of birthday greetings! I used to count my cards, saying I needed more cards than I am years old. But now, most people don’t send actual cards but send greetings by text, email and Facebook. I count those now and by that standard I am way ahead of my quota for year 70! So many greetings. I am so spoiled.
But being spoiled has been a feature of my life. Yes, I was, perhaps the unplanned fifth child, but I never felt anything but loved and treasured by my parents and my sibings. I was born into an era when health care was assumed, education was readily available, a graduate was pretty much guaranteed a job, there was little global threat, vaccines were endorsed and trusted, and life was pretty simple. In many ways I have lived in a golden age when communication was easy and invention was rapid paced.
Moving into my seventh decade is one for which I am grateful and I have no illusions that my life has been graced with many benefits. Benefits that come to me not through any effort of my own but through the throughtful and generous work of previous generations. I am spoiled and I can only hope that my contributions to life will give benefit to those who come after me.
