A Little Sister’s Birthday

Today was my little sister’s birthday. All things considered, I think today turned out exceptionally better than she expected.

In order to explain, let me back up. The story begins with disappointing past birthdays, and the saga continues with the difficult year we all went through last year. The emotional scars of some realities have taken their toll. When we've been hurt, we all throw up walls to protect ourselves from being hurt again. More often than not, though, those walls prove to be counterproductive—the only difference being that we are the ones hurting ourselves now, instead of outside forces inflicting wounds upon our tender hearts.

This year, Chris decided she did not want anything to be done for her birthday—she didn’t want presents and she didn’t want to celebrate. She said she wanted it to be treated like any other day.

Right, well. Easier said than done, particularly when there are people around who want to celebrate the day you were born, who want to celebrate you. 

My parents, my younger siblings (and some of my older siblings a two or time)—we’re all talking to her,  trying to get to the root cause of her refusal to do anything for her birthday (why don’t you want to?), something more than her because I just don’t reason.

She listed a few reasons to me, we talked through them a little a time or two, even as recent as 12am today.

So...my mom had eventually gone forward with some plans to go to the lake today, despite Chris’s statements of not wanting to do anything. I think Mom did it more in hopes of Chris changing her mind more than anything, hoping that if someone else made the plans, it might deal with one issue of Chris’s reluctance--that is, the hope that comes with making plans and the crushing disappointment when people don’t make the expectation hold up.

This morning, my mom comes in and asks me if I think Chris will be game for the idea of going to the lake; I told her I honestly did not know. However, when she presented the idea and discussed it with Chris while I tried not to be a Zombie in the background, Chris agreed.

So we rush to pull everything together...eventually make it out of here at 12:00. We did not eat lunch until 3:00, but who cares about that when the food was absolutely delicious? Mom’s special, family-recipe potato salad (so yummy!) and grilled chicken, with fruit and beverage choice of soda, juice packs, or cold water.

(I won’t tease you with pictures.)

Due to certain health issues, I forewent sodas and juice packs in favour of water with slices of lemon, lime, and cucumber. Healthier for me, anyway.

Enough about food, though, because really, how interesting is that? I should talk about what a blast we had today.

*** 

The lake, my lovelies, was beautiful.

The dog didn’t seem to think so, though...

We had a few neighbours throughout the day...

One of our human ones caught a bass (his friend let us take pictures)...

[If fish make you squeamish, you will probably want to skip these.] 

 Look at how you can see the bones in the fins...

 

So that is what the inside of their mouths look like...

The pooch really wanted the tasty fish...

Hope the cuteness makes up for the fish photos!

The guy who was there fishing with his friend and let us take pictures of their fish said he’d been having a good day fishing until someone shot out the windows on his car. I thought that was pretty sad. What is wrong with people?

***

All that aside, everyone had fun playing in the water...

...but I was content with the camera, obviously. Here are a few examples of the beautiful and interesting things I saw today!

The poor pooch is tired...

The pooch is awake...

Obviously, there’s something interesting going on. Obviously.

Isn’t he a pretty dog?

***

Later on, around about 6:00, this older guy shows up and starts feeding the ducks that had been waddling around our area all day. We had tried to feed them some fruit (pieces of apple, some watermelon), but apparently they don’t or can’t eat that (?). Anyway, this guy brought moldy whole wheat bread and the ducks came right up to him—he even petted one!

I snatched up the camera, I did a bold thing—I went over there, I asked if I could get pictures, and he offered to share his bread with me, so that I could feed the ducks and let them come right up to me. Suffice to say, I got better pictures. (Unfortunately, I didn’t get to pet one...)