Pippi

Usually around my birthday I get depressed. The usual questions always pop up: What have I done with my life, really? Why am I not married? Why don't I have children? Where is all of this headed and will I ever be a grown up? All of these add up to me beating myself over the head for a couple of weeks, throwing myself into too much exercise and too little eating and generally being miserable.

This year, Luke has started moving into the house. There is stuff out of place. As a single woman of some years, I am used to having my stuff in my places and nothing else. I'm... particular. And I've asked for him to disrupt that by living here and really, really, living here with, you know, his stuff. But now his stuff is here. So I'm freaking out about that a little bit. Add to all of this my anxiety about House Bill 3284 having the veto overridden and a real possibility of it becoming law and you have a tense Mindie.

When I was a little girl, I was stressed from about 1973 until about 2009. Generally speaking, anyway. We moved a lot and there wasn't a whole lot of stability. I had three older sisters and just sort of hung out in the background. Sometimes I played in the closet. My favorite place to play was under the staircase in one of the houses we rented in California. It was close and easy to get to and safe. No grown ups allowed. And there were Disney movies that would come on television to help me escape. This was before I learned to read and drown myself in books. My favorite one was called "Pippi Longstockings", and the heroine was a little girl with freckles and long red braids and she was never afraid. She could do anything, defeat any enemy and sing while she did it. She made me happy and gave me hope that little girls could win.

Tomorrow is my birthday. Luke went with me to get my driver's license renewed, then to clean out my office at OU for the summer. Then we went by Target and for my birthday present, he bought me a bike. A beautiful bike, a Schwinn hybrid. Big handlebars. Big bike seat for my big butt. A place to carry stuff in the back. Oh yes, a happy bike. I wanted to sing and wear a long skirt so I could dance in it and throw confetti. So I named her Pippi. And when I get done writing this, we're going for a ride. But first, maybe I'll go paint some freckles and braid my hair.