Yesterday was my birthday. It was a good birthday, as birthdays go. Matt took me for a romantic weekend in the mountains. He rented the cabin, handled all the details, the works. It was loverly. I, however, forgot my camera so there won’t be any photographic evidence of the beauty of the joint. I’ll just tell you and words will have to be enough.

We stayed in a beautiful chalet-like thingamabob that sat literally right on the river. We took the dogs. We soaked in some rare sunshine on the back deck. We watched some movies and just generally relaxed. One night we stayed up until the sun rose to meet us.

That was by accident. After watching three movies (all horribly done) in a row, we drug ourselves to bed to crash out. Only it suddenly dawned on me that I was now three hours into my birthday and, as such, I am now 36 years old. That’s when I had a complete emotional and psychological breakdown. Poor, poor Matt. He had to sit there and listen as I raged and wept and mourned the passage of time and my inability to slow it. I was bitter and sad and angry and wistful all at the same time. He lay there and held me and encouraged me to get it all out, let it all go, and made me feel just generally better and more hopeful. We finally slept sometime around five in the morning.

It was probably just hormones, just a temporary rush of chemicals and lunacy coursing wildly through my veins. It’s over now. We got through it. It’s nice to know I have someone who cares enough to stay up all through the night with me until I feel like life is worthing living all over again, someone who points out the light when all I can see is the blackness of night. I got a lot of really cool stuff for my birthday, but that was most likely the coolest.