birthday buddy

fortunate enough to share a birthday season with someone you love? if so, what are some of your traditions?

i have a birthday twin; "soul sisters" we call each other (i was born on her 31st) who is still very much alive and i had a birthday buddy (my professor, mentor and friend who would be celebrating her 57th tomorrow, the day after mine). she called me her "21st birthday present" and for 15 years we celebrated the joys of not only shared, but shared SUMMER celebrations and thanked each other for being born at this time of year as if we had anything to do with it. and it was with her--for my own 21st--that i had my first champagne.

we also wrote letters for 15 years. not blogs or just emails, but real letters on cool stationery that required stamps. i've saved everything in a big vintage suitcase in my room. when i open it, it smells of lavendar and vanilla. mixed cassette tapes (yes, tapes!) tumble out along with a blend of sympathy cards, far-side comics, jane austen novels and grief workshop fliers. it smells somehow sweeter each time i crack open the lid but i still cry.

i got an e-card from her daughter today and i thought how sweet and how painful it might have been for her to send that to me knowing what tomorrow is. and i imagine their lives, how we all go on by some mysterious power, both propping and propelling us forward. sometimes when they laugh i look up and expect to see her, sitting at the table with Good Earth tea in hand.

then i blink and remember. but we still share the celebration and nothing can take that away. in the meantime, i guess our letters will just require supernatural postage. colleen, i still miss you.