Embarking on another trip around the sun, my birthday always falls somewhere during our April week vacation from school, so this year Bill and I decided to travel to New York City to celebrate. I love NYC, for about three or four days tops. Living in rural Maine, sometimes I crave the crush of people, the excitement and energy of millions of type A personalities all rushing somewhere. The constantly hurrying people, the smells, the sounds, the bumping and bustling, the forgetting of oneself as each of us becomes just a tiny speck in this always changing mass of humanity, all this affirms and helps to remind us that every one of us is one little part of a much larger whole, thereby focussing our minds and keeping us connected and humble. And in NYC, with all the museums, the restaurants, the Broadway plays, I am convinced that nowhere else on earth can such extraordinary culture and talent be found.  

   We made a mistake in our planning this week though. Spending Saturday enjoying fine weather on Mt. Desert Island, hiking a 6 mile loop and then going to a movie and dinner at Reel Pizza (an experience no one who comes to Bar Harbor should miss), instead of leaving on Sunday we decided to have a day at home to get everything ready and then leave on Monday. However, that April Monday in Boston is Marathon Day, so since we were taking the bus from Boston to NYC we needed to park the car somewhere near the MBTA to get to South Station to catch our bus. As we soon found out, absolutely every parking area was full. Totally full. What does one do with a car that is not needed in a city that has no parking available? This was an enormous problem! Luckily, our youngest daughter came to our rescue by asking her boyfriend's family, who lives quite close to my old stomping grounds in Cambridge near Harvard Square, if we could use their parking permit. Thankfully they agreed. So we left the car and keys with them, and rushed to the red line to take the T into South Station, getting there in plenty of time to even have a quick lunch in the sunshine before boarding the bus. Lesson learned: never, ever plan on parking anywhere in Boston on Marathon Monday!  

   Bus arrivals in NYC (from Boston) are very strange; they no longer dock at Penn Station, but leave riders off on certain streets throughout the city. We were dropped off amid the traffic at 38th Street, which turned out to be only a few blocks away from the little studio we had rented. Usually we stay a good half hour or more subway's ride away from the action in midtown or Greenwich Village, but this time we could walk almost everywhere we wanted to go. And I love to walk. As we checked in there were tickets for Broadway plays being sold right at the front desk, so, being something I've always wanted to do, we bought two tickets for Tuesday night's "Phantom of the Opera." Ecstatic, we walked to dinner at a new (to us) vegan restaurant, By Chloe. Good choice for our first night in New York.  

   Tuesday morning I wanted to again go to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, to see the cherry blossoms and to meet up with a friend whom I had met in France a year ago. It was a gorgeous day, sunny and not overly warm; most of the cherry blossoms were not yet in bloom, but my friend, Dolores, was there, sitting near the tulips, waiting for us to appear. It is always wonderful to be reunited with friends, to catch up for a bit, to rekindle a connection. This day was off to a very good start. As the afternoon wore on, we enjoyed a very late lunch at one of our favorite restaurants near the Village, Sacred Chow. And then "Phantom"! What a delightful, amazing experience! I was totally hooked on Broadway. Would we try to see another play tomorrow night?

   On Wednesday, after a lovely long morning at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and a special birthday lunch at delicious HanGowi, we walked to TKTS to see what plays were available for 50% off that evening. Located at 47th and Broadway, for decades TKTS has been known as the place to find half-price tickets to many Broadway plays. (Why hadn't anyone told us about this before?) So we debated, and finally chose to see "Miss Saigon," which was good, but could not compare to "Phantom." (The dramatic helicopter scene was my favorite part.) Two Broadway plays in two nights; could this week get any better?

   Actually, no. Spending those festive, action packed days in NYC turned out to be the highlight of our week. And I found I was dreading my coming birthday; how could turning a new number make any difference to anything at all? It is just a marker, a counting of accumulated rides around the sun; I would be no different once my old number was behind me. I must have always felt this way, as I remembered dreading turning 13. For some reason, to me that meant the end of childhood, and I did not want to begin a new part of my life. But we have no choice, or at least no good or reasonable choice. And so, if we are lucky, it comes. As it did this Friday, when morning shone grey and rainy, a soft, absolutely perfect, gentle rain, and I bid good-bye to my previous age. Did I feel any different? No, it wasn't that. I think it is just that once people reach a certain age we all are programmed to expect everyone to be old, to be decrepit, to become broken; it's all downhill from there. But I'm no different than I was yesterday! I can still out-walk, outrun, out-dance, out-hike, out-travel people decades younger! Why, just because of a number, should anyone think that they are less able to do anything, unless, of course, there is a physical limitation. But physical limitations are not respective of age, therefore this thinking one is "old" has to be our own self-limiting creation, a mental limitation of our own making. So I am fighting against that, against putting myself into a box that says "Because of your age you cannot or should not do this," trying to forget my age, and living as if I didn't even know how old I am. I do not want to place limits on myself, to use age as an excuse not to do something. It's a very poor excuse after all, as any excuse is.

   How old would you be if you didn't know your age? That's an old chestnut, but I delight in thinking about it. What age would I choose? What age would you choose? Does it matter? And if it does, why? Putting mental limitations on ourselves makes no sense at all, whether it's our age, our sex, our color, our religion, whatever. We should expand rather than contract ourselves as we grow, and live our improbable lives as fully as we can. So don't ask me my age. I won't tell you because I am actively working to forget it.