Saturday Celebrations

Today the sun is supposed to do what it does best in Colorado - that is shine. After the 6:30 meeting, I will go out for a run. Six Miles is on my plan for today. Yesterday I bought new shoes - and I will have to take a photo because they are cute! And they are also very good running shoes, but who can resist very good running shoes with pink flowers on them? (They go with my new guava running bra - and it is important for your bra and shoes to match, especially when you run very slow and feel like you are going to puke after a long run. I will take anything that helps.)

There was evidence of a shift of teutonic plates in my family this week. (Edit: I cannot imagine why I would have used an earthquake reference this morning - I had no idea about the situation in Chile.) My twin daughters will be 31 years old on Monday. One of them is an alcoholic. The other one isn't. Can you imagine what that is like for them? For their family? Yes, you can. I know you can. Anyway... several years ago one of the daughters (guess which one) showed up incredibly high and twitchy and crazy for the annual birthday celebration. The other one got so angry and fed up, that after years of just accepting and loving her sister no matter how crazy it got - and it got plenty crazy - she just got angry and said she wasn't going to have another birthday ruined by her sister. And she stopped speaking to her. (And when I wonder how God feels when I am busy resenting someone else, I just have to think of how much it hurt me to have this going on in my family, and then I might have an inkling of what an offense it is to be hatin'.)

Last year she resolved to be out of town for her birthday. Although her sister was newly sober at the time, no one trusted her to stay that way (well, except for me).

This year my sober alcoholic daughter is working all weekend. When I tried to get us all together to go to the Ethiopian Restaurant (which is one of our birthday traditions) she said she couldn't go. I figured that her sister and brother wouldn't mind if she wasn't there.

What a wonderful thing it was to hear them both express their disappointment. To hear the sister who wouldn't speak to the other say "It just won't be fun without my sister there." Oh my goodness. Her brother, my son, said "well, let's just drive up to her work and surprise her there."

I called her and told her how disappointed they were... she cried, I cried... and she said she would find a way to be there. She was able to find someone to work part of her shift and we will all be able to go out to the Ethiopian Restaurant today to celebrate their birthday.

This is written so poorly - but I am in a hurry to get out of here and I don't have time to edit appropriately. So, thank you for reading it - it is probably confusing with the "hers" and "shes" and sisters and brother. But it is a wonderful day in the life of a sober mom of a sober daughter. And two other wonderful children too.