Birthday Magic

"I think, at a child's birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity." -Eleanor Roosevelt

^ Another birthday for my fourth-born, another wintry adventure in the great out of doors. Here in the Pacific Northwest, that means wet and wild. Temperatures dipped to the low 30s, winds blew in off the Puget Sound, and dainty flurries of snowflakes dazzled our eyes.

^ Our destination was the Skagit Wildlife Preserve's Wiley Slough near Conway, Washington. We hiked on raised gravel paths, winding in and out of swampy, stream-filled slough country. Bald eagles and blue herons, countless ducks and soaring seabirds kept us amazed and entertained.

^ Gracie was granted full off-leash privileges and while she spent most of her time hiking along the soft and dry trails, she couldn't resist a few tromps through the deep mud and nasty brambles of the rough terrain. A hunting dog's gotta do what a hunting dog's gotta do. 

I woke up this morning, the day of my fourth-born's birthday, looked out the window, and gasped in pure delight.

The sky was filled with softly swirling snowflakes. 

They danced through the air, 

gently floating up and down as if they were in no hurry at all to land, 

and filling my eyes with magic.

* * * * *

Birthday magic is a real thing. 

No, not so much for the birthday person themselves, who certainly may enjoy a wonderful day of special treats and good wishes, but more for the mothers (and fathers too) who experience the original Birth Day. 

Birthday magic fills my heart on those four mornings each year when I marvel (still) at the incredible events of my daughters' births: 

the intensity of physically moving them into the world

the sensation of holding their tiny bodies against me

the strange idea of them as little humans now completely separate from me

the miracle of their very beings. 

These memories stir up in me a feeling of lightness, of swirling joy, of happiness suspended in air.

They feel like a sky full of softly swirling snowflakes

And my heart fills, once again, with birthday magic. 

* * * * *

I share these thoughts with loving respect to mothers (and fathers too) of adopted children - magic surely fills their hearts on the days when they first meet their children too. But my experiences, as I share them here, are with giving birth so I simply write from what I know.