Sunday's Child

Today is my birthday. It is raining outside, cozy inside, a perfect excuse for staying in the house and puttering. My husband has been very pleased with himself all week, because he says this year he knew just what to get me. By this morning, he was practically levitating with eagerness to have me open my gifts. He woke the kids up at 7 a.m. and they all gathered round to watch me tear off the wrapping paper.

There were four presents, a beautiful green, white and blue cabana-striped tote bag and a small antiqued peppermint tin box from my girl (so this was what she was hiding from me as we shopped in Old Navy yesterday), a very cool key chain with a digital picture frame from my boy (loved the rough, earnest, wrapped-this-himself look of the package), and a photo screen that holds forty images from all of them (they figured I could put it on my desk at work since I'm there so much of the time now). And then my husband held out the last gift, this one from him. Inside was the stylus and pad (with Adobe Elements software) that I have been wanting for my graffiti art! No wonder he was so pleased with himself.

My son had to go to a track meet and my husband drove him, and sat through the morning on a cold bleacher in the rain. Meanwhile my daughter went back to sleep (7 a.m. is way early on a Sunday morning!) and I read and talked on the phone and watched In Treatment on HBO. Then the boys came back home, at which point my husband hooked up my gizmo, and my son stretched out on the couch, cocooned in his comforter, and promptly went to sleep. By then, my daughter was up doing homework.

We were supposed to go out to dinner, but I just felt like staying home, plus my girl was wrestling with a history research paper and a creative writing English assignment, so my chef lover husband rustled up garlic-butter shrimp and scalloped potatoes. Delicious! With all the homework and drawing and sleeping and cooking, we didn't get to the happy birthday singing and the cake eating until almost midnight. Which fit perfectly with the sweetly meandering nature of the rest of my day. Thank you, family! I made out like...well, you know who.

Update on my gizmo: So there's a bit of a learning curve with the stylus. You don't just hook it up and suddenly you're DaVinci. But it is soooo much fun! Art is my path not taken, which could explain my deep admiration for artists. I actually went to college to major in studio art and found creative writing instead. I love both disciplines, but the difference is, writing excites me, art calms me down. Getting back to drawing, even in this super techie way, feels like coming home.