D1 at 28

So our awesome T Day weekend draws nearly to a close -- but not just yet!  Today is D1's 28th birthday, so we have one more bit of celebration to do.

Yesterday I skipped the final Canes game of the year, at D2's request.  Actually, she didn't ask me to opt out, but chose not to go herself, and so I gave my sister of another mister Mirta the tickets.  Instead, the Ds, Wifey, and I went to Missy's house, for her annual post T Day kids get together.

Missy is the mom of two close friends, of the Ds, Nicole and Scott, and each year she hosts a brunch with all of Nicole and Scott's closest friends.  The friends used to come while on vacation from college, and now the young adults are in actual careers.  This year, Missy invited Wifey and me as well, and so we caught up with old friends and their kids.

D1's college roomie Hillary's parents were there, though Hillary was with her new husband and in laws up north.  Marty and I reminisced about it was just yesterday we were moving the girls into the sorority house, and now Hillary is married and living in Chicago, and D1 has started her own successful business, and will be married soon.

The kids are, fortunately, a collection of winners.  There were young lawyers, and accountants, and one young fellow, a Stanford grad, is working for Tesla, for heaven's sake!  He regaled us of tales of that company, and how they do things. They will take over the world, it is clear...

After the party, we went for Dad and Mom/daughter manis and pedis. For me, just the pedi -- I'm not yet metro enough for the mani.  We sat in the massage chairs and laughed, and I got to watch some of the Ohio State/Michigan game, while the skillful Vietnamese lady made my "gross old man feet" look positively lovely...

From there, we headed back home, and had an impromptu neighbor gathering.  Carrie had her family in from NY, and she came by with her enormous dog Cane, who spends his days yearning for play dates with our strange rescue.  As the dogs ran around, we chatted with Carrie's parents, who are originally Bronx and now VERY Long Island...D2 loved their accents, of course.

D1 left, for a late night to be -- a Latin Jewish wedding between, I think, an Argentine and Costa Rican.  D2 and Wifey and I watched TV -- the Canes won handily, making me, a happy Dad, even happier...

And today D1 is 28.  We plan to meet for lunch on the way to drop her sister at MIA.  These nearly three decades have raced past -- I clearly recall celebrating her first birthday, in our tiny house in Kendall, with a Little Mermaid cake, and much younger versions of most of our current friends...

As I told her today, the years after have been her friend -- giving her an amazing life, with only, Big Man willing, the best to come.

Wifey and I were talking on Friday, as we were on our way to fetch D2 from her sister's apartment following a shabbat dinner...why T Day is my favorite holiday.  First, of course, it's because of the family feasting together, and thanking the Big Man for our manifold blessings.  But then it occurred to me that I also love it, because it's a time when the Ds would visit, from college, and now, in D2's case, from her NYC job, and when I dropped them off at MIA, it was with the knowledge that the NEXT visit was less than a month away.

And so it is with D2 -- she already has her tickets to return home 12/24 -- Wifey's Birthday Eve.  So it puts a happier shine on the usual sadness of saying goodbye...

And in the mean time, Happy 28, D1.  May you continue to soar -- even higher.