Emeralds & Mountain Bikes

It's a Boys World. On Friday night after some night fishing on the Beef Island Bridge with 12 little boys and their fathers, we had 9 boys back here for a braai supposedly to eat the fish, but luckily we had lots of ribs (just in case) and a sleepover. I think Tyler and I got to bed about 2:30am and the boys got even less sleep, so by Saturday evening, after a day of morning yoga and Saturday afternoon race training for the boys ( and a spoily hair session for me) we were all scuppered.

Sunday was my birthday and I had a wonderfully relaxed and (I do not like this over-used term but in this instance it fits) blessed day. I was spoilt with Eggs Benedict in bed, phone calls from South Africa and all my wonderful pressies: very pretty earrings from T, some age-defying cream from my Mother, a beautiful print from Kathryn, exquisite linen from Beth and wait for it....drumroll......a mountain bike! Which just about sums me up I suppose: a middle-aged gal learning how to mountain bike in good jewellery!

I spent most of the day reading my book from James called Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake by Anna Quinlen - which is all about getting older, something I now have to start staring down. I was first alerted to Anna's writing many years ago when she gave a commencement speech which was widely circulated amongst the management consultant circles in which I swam and it had a profound impact on me. In it she exhorted the students to 'get a life and not a resume'. She's a great analytical voice and writes very forcefully on contemporary society, and I urge you to read her. It was a wonderful way to spend most of one's birthday and some things made me laugh out loud,  like when her very emotional daughter calls her after a tornado had struck their home and she says "oh honey, I'm too old to die young now!"


Anyhow after all that philosophy it was necessary to literally and figuratively get on my bike, and off we all went - Tyler running after William who still has his trainer wheels on and the two older ones showing-off like mad, and we rode to the tidal pool for a swim and then pushed our bikes back up the hill, home. In the evening Tyler took me to the new Brandywine, and I ate lobster salad & the duck special and drank Verve - asking myself if life could get any better.