A Belated Birthday Thank You

World: I had a wonderful 21st birthday and I owe it all to formerly far away friends, hidden from my life for the academic year, who returned to me with the attention, warmth, and zane that always typified our friendships.

Behold last year: a picture snapped at 12:00 am, June 22, 2007 - the twentieth anniversary of my birth. While a pretty cool photo (thanks Ariel S.!), it was false, acted, foreign, untrue. My twentieth birthday - at the end of an accomplished but personality-draining Shana Bet - did not put me in a celebratory, hurrah-to-all-that-is-life-and-I-can-conquer-! sort of mood. I was exhausted and, despite yeshiva friends, still somehow alone. My teenage years, a constant source of pride and nostalgia, had finally ceased. Not with a bang - as the photo may convey - but the whimper of a fun-loving soul struggling to balance heightened seriousness and new commitments. Thus, this picture is not of me, but of someone I hoped to be. Sigh . . . The insincerity is damning.

The photo is, however, an accurate depiction of my 21st birthday. With their time and care, mi amigos reminded me just how great they are, how much fun I can enjoy in their company, and how - Jeez! and Freekin'! - 21 is an opportunity for life, not a death knell upon youth.

Thank you.