Wednesday was my birthday. I am now 48. I wish I could say it was a fun, special day, but it really wasn’t. Paul was in L.A. on business and if he had been around I think things would have been  a lot different.

It started off just like any other day. I emptied the dishwasher, cooked breakfast and folded laundry. Since all the girls had a half day I told them I would pick them up from school, take them to lunch and then to a movie and wouldn’t that be fun? Not. Things got off to a rough start when I picked up Eva from school and some crazy, lunatic woman almost ran her over with her car, EVEN THOUGH I FRANTICALLY KEPT HONKING AT HER TO STOP.  I don’t know if it was  just the culmination of a lot of stress between the economy and that 16-year-old boy being stabbed, but I just lost it and had a shouting match with the stupid woman in the parking lot. I hurled epithets like, “LEARN HOW TO DRIVE, MORON!” and the like. I got particularly incensed when she told me she was going to pray for me. (With drivers like her on the road, I am going to need lots of prayers.) Needless to say, my children were mortified.

Then Eva complained that she did not want to go to the restaurant I picked. (Whose birthday was it???)  We went to my favorite burrito place and Eva sulked a bit. Then to the movies, which was fun, except that I was tired and couldn’t stay awake.  We saw Where the Wild Things Are. Very good. I highly recommend it. Afterward, in the lobby of the theatre I saw one of Sophia’s friends holding a large bunch of Happy Birthday balloons with a sign pinned to her chest that read: “I’m 16 today.”  So I went up to wish her a happy birthday and tell her it was my birthday too. The girl looked at me like a deer in the headlights and kind of rolled her eyes. I guess speaking to her was a  weird parental thing to do, as evidenced by Sophia’s horrified facial expression. How was I to know? I left the theatre feeling like I couldn’t do anything right and vowed to spend my birthday next year alone.

We had takeout pizza for dinner and afterward we sat around the table just hanging out until finally I said, “I sure could go for some cake right about now.” ( I had bought my own cake earlier in the day and put it in the refrigerator.) That prompted them to get up off their lazy duffs and serve me some cake. They were pretty good about it except they complained I didn’t buy ice cream or soda.  I do have to say the gifts and cards were wonderful. I will treasure them forever. Cheryl wrote in her card that I was “the best step mom ever.” And Eva wrote, “I hope 48 is better than the 47 birthdays that went before it.”  I realized that I cannot take teenage self-absorption personally. When the girls were small, they doted on me on my birthday. But now that they are teenagers, things are different. In time, this will pass.  I am looking forward to my husband coming home tonight. I miss him terribly.