Fifty-two

 

Paul had recently turned 27 years old when I met him at a ballroom dancing class, and today he turned 52 years old. As Nadia often reminds him, only three more years until we are eligible to join the "Best Years Fellowship" at our church, which is for those who are 55+. Last week we had pizza and I ordered more than usual in honor of his birthday, and yesterday I made rigatoni and meatballs for dinner so that we could have that yesterday and again tonight as that's another of his favorite meals. I didn't bake him any of his favorite desserts because we still have quite a few Christmas cookies that haven't been eaten yet. I got him a very big container of peanut M&Ms, a t-shirt, and a few more of his favorite candy bars. The kids each made him a card. Nadia actually made him two cards as one of the cards was from Milo. Neither of us are much into throwing parties. He's never thrown one for me (which is totally fine that is NOT a complaint), and I threw him three parties over the past 25 years. Two of those times I was rather sleep deprived as his master's degree graduation party was held when Nadia was 5 weeks old, and his 40th birthday party was held when Ian was 3 weeks old. For the majority of the past 25 years, we celebrated each other's birthdays with a date (typically we went out to eat), but that went by the wayside at some point over the past 12 years. The first time I ever attempted to schedule something special for the five of us to do on my birthday was unfortunately in 2020. Naturally all those plans went out the window due to COVID. I've rescheduled it for my 50th birthday in April of this year. Our Sunday School class sang Happy Birthday to Paul yesterday morning, and the kids and I serenaded him today. We hope that this next year of life is a good one for Paul.

Paul would have driven to Baltimore today if his back was back to normal. Thankfully his back is much better than it was a month ago. He's planning to go to Baltimore tomorrow and come back home on Friday evening. The fact that the trade show was cancelled last year was one fallout from COVID that Paul actually appreciated. 

Speaking of COVID, my dad also probably has COVID, which isn't surprising considering Margie came down with it last week. He's being tested tomorrow morning. Margie received a monoclonal antibody infusion this morning, which hopefully will help her. They had both been vaccinated but hadn't received their booster shots, and Margie's immune system has been weakened due to the chemo treatments. She was supposed to have another chemo treatment last week, but that has been postponed due to testing positive for COVID. We're praying for both of them to recover as soon as possible. Wendy's family tested negative. We haven't been tested, but none of us have any symptoms, and it's now been a week since we were with my dad and Margie. Here's to hoping and praying that the pandemic comes to an end sometime this year.