我的生日 - 自己的新开始

In the last several weeks I've been witness to the declarations of 2 New Years, and though for each of them I made resolutions to change things about myself and how I live here, none of them made much of an impression on me. That is not to say I didn't have a wonderful time with my friends, the celebrations were loads of fun, but for me they were rather arbitrary - we had fun for the sake of fun. Nothing in my world came to an end and nothing new came into being.

However, my own birthday (February 5th) was different.

In the past couple years I didn't think much of my birthdays. I don't drink except with friends and at people's houses, and only at their insistence, so my 21st wasn't anything profound, and when I turned 22 I was working as a student-teacher and living with two roommates who both had very busy schedules, so celebration didn't really enter into my thoughts.
...plus, in general, I prefer a life with minimal possessions, so I'm usually not big on material gifts.

This year I found myself far from home, no family around, friends all busy, and my apartment practically devoid of food, so I spent the day looking up recipes and going to the market and the open-air grocers to get food and equipment.
So there was no preparation for a big celebration, no intense socialization, most of the day I spent by myself. And even though I only turned one day older I knew it was a day that was more MINE than any other day in the year.

I felt myself reborn, recharged, I had energy that had been lacking for months, and though it was a cloudy day I felt warmer and more content than I had in nearly all of the days of winter that preceded it.

I'm still behind in lesson plans, my Chinese is still quite weak, and my cooking alone is no where near adequate enough to keep me alive. (Electric burners are better than nothing, but a stove with an actual flame would do such wonders).
At last I feel like I have wherewithal to MEET these difficulties.

...kinda wish I'd had it when the vacation started nearly a month ago, but I guess things happen at their appointed time, neither after or before.