it was a birthday that ended as quietly as it started. all that fuss about birthdays slowly start to wane the moment you hit your 30’s where you literally pause for a couple of seconds to compute for your age when someone asks you how old you are.

it doesn’t help that i’m not exactly a genius at math. i’ve always hated those flash cards that teachers used to torment kids in school: divide the class to 3 or 4 lines where everyone in the team takes turn answering as fast as they could. even then, i hated the competition. but not as much as i hated the attention. i wouldn’t exactly say i’m dumb but given those kinds of circumstances, i was practically stupid.

those times probably traumatized me in ways i am not consciously aware of but fast forward to now and people ask me how old i am, my mind goes on a quick vacation before i blurt out, “32.”

that’s when i stopped counting.

to celebrate my birthday somehow, jeff and i went on a little road trip with nothing but a vague destination in mind. we wanted to go to olinda but halfway through the journey and somewhere between going around in a circle in belgrave, we decided that having no itinerary would probably be best and just enjoy the scenery as we go.

in short, we were f%cking starving. anywhere was a good place to eat.

stumbled into this charming place at emerald with its wooden shelves and a generous display of bread, cakes, pastries, jams and what-have-you inviting you to come closer to have a look. it has a very grandma element to it. i wasn’t surprised to see a lot of actual grandmas there as well. i reckon it’s the kind of place seniors like to hang around in. it’s definitely got that vibe and i loved it.

emerald seems like a nice town. i’m not familiar with the demographics but there seemed to be a lot of older people and young mothers with their prams and dogs out and about enjoying that warm, sunny tuesday.

suffice it to say that after we had our fill of cheese & spinach focaccia, and that couscous salad jeff ordered that i ended up almost finishing which sounds so grammatically wrong and redundant, we didn’t bother driving to where we originally wanted to go.

instead, we headed back home to take a nap. because at this age, sometimes the best present you can get is good, quality sleep.

p.s. big thank you to el2 who shouted us dinner later that night. even if the oysters didn’t happen, thai food more than made up for it. 🙂

*raven at 1 year & 5 months old