Every year when I blow out the candles on my birthday cake, I always wish for a cure for diabetes.
I see the flames twinkling and casting shadows across the pretty flowers made of icing.
I squeeze my eyes shut tight.
I say the words in my head, "I wish for it to happen this year...please let it happen this year...let this year be the year a cure happens."
Every year I do this.
I know some people probably think it's silly or ridiculous...a waste of a wish...juvenile...or stupid.
I still do it every year though.
I turned 38 today (technically yesterday now at this point of the night) and it was such an incredible day. I spent time with my little family and really saw them...I wasn't distracted by crochet orders or needing to wash the dishes in the sink...or even by the fact that I am another year older. I saw them. I saw my husband...his smile...his eyes...the way he looks at me. I saw my daughter...the dimples in her cheeks as she laughed...the light in her eyes as she handed me a bracelet and card she made for me. I saw them...really saw them.
Today was a good day...amazing actually...one that I will think about years from now and smile.
Yes, diabetes was there...it's always there...sometimes more in the spotlight than I'd like...but for the most part after all these years, I've learned how to see everything else first. I don't mean I ignore diabetes now...because obviously I don't. I mean that I have learned how to see her dimples....her eyes...the way she walks just like me...the grin that spreads across her face when she reads something funny and she doesn't know I can see her. I see these things first...I see these things in the spotlight.
No matter how many more birthday wishes I choose to use on a cure, I know that as I am saying the wish in my head and blowing out those twinkling flames....I will see her face in my mind...smiling.
