Birthday Wish

“No one else can ever make your choices for you. Your choices are yours alone. They are as much a part of you as every breath you will take, every moment of your life.” - Dr. Shad Helmstetter

For the second year in a row, I will celebrate my birthday in Italy. For many, a birthday is a day of celebration, filled with friends and family and cake (for me, gelato!). This Saturday, I’ll turn the lonely and highly-forgettable 2-3.

Forgettable - ironic since my word  is UNforgettable....

It’s that famous line “...Nobody loves you when your 23...”

Although I’m excited for my birthday, it will require time of reflection on my part - to look back and recall specific moments in time where I had to make choices; choices that have made me who I am today. 

Why do I have to do this? Since I live in the present, and not the past?Because the choices I have made have formed my persona and my current being. The choices I will make in the future need to be the right choices; thought-out with careful consideration and examined with a fine-tooth comb. No doubt I will falter along the way, we all do. Afterall, we are just human.

I think it’s important that we all take time to ourselves to reflect on the choices we make in life. 

Not for regreat, but for examination and understanding.

Every day I wonder if I made the right choice moving to Rome after graduating. And every day, when Bea learns a new word in English, or when we are swimming in the pool and she gives me an unexpected hug, or kiss, any doubt in my mind is wiped away. 

I’m having a positive impact on the growth of a child, and the joy in my heart could burst it wide-open when I see the excitement in her eyes, or hear that laugh of hers. 

How could this decision not have been the right one? How chould this choice not impact me in a positive way, especially since I am having a positive impace on someone else? This may not be a “real” job, but it’s a choice I made, and I will treat it delicately and act accordingly until my time is up. 

It’s no secret that choosing our path in life is a difficult and sleep-depriving task. But, I believe that the choices I have made up until now have only helped me to grow and gain knowledge and wisdom. 

So come Saturday, when I blow out my candles and devour my gelato, I will make a wish, a wish for my future. I will not be a “forgettable” 23-year-old, I will be unforgettable to everyone around me, and with careful consideration, the next chapter in my story will be a choice only I can make. And no matter what that choice is, I will be a stronger person because of it.