Gifts

I'm going to turn 34 this Friday.

I usually get sort of depressed before birthdays. It always feel like i haven't accomplished enough in the last year and that, in my mind, I'm supposed to be in a different place then I actually am.

I think also, that being afar from Israel and my family makes this worth, I feel like I don't have any roots where I live, and that my life here is based on borrowed time. I keep having dreams about the past, and about a strange chain of event that makes me leave Ned and New York and go back to Israel, go back to my old apartment, then to my ex boyfriend and the apartment we had together, then back and back into my past personal history.

I'm thinking about the future and the choices I made. I'm thinking about growing old and having, or not having children.

I'm thinking about Ned and I separating and me being all alone in the world. I'm thinking about my mother saying "I told you so".


On Monday, I went to buy a present for my dad, his birthday is one day before me, and though usually I get books for birthdays, I decided to spend less on shipping this year and more on the gift and decided to get him a small iPod. I got one for me to.

I opened it yesterday and was more excited about the clear plastic box the the actual product, it was really beautiful. Ned and I talked about making something out of it. I thought about making a paper butterfly and putting it in the box like those preserved insects displays.

In the morning we found a dead butterfly on the floor. It came into the apartment a couple of days ago, I thought it found it's way out and flew away, but as it turned out, it died. I put it in the box, a gift from the world to me.

It feels very symbolic, maybe this is about changing, or about getting old, or about preserving the present for the future. Maybe this is about the fact that life, even after it's gone, is cooler and more beautiful then an iPod can ever be, maybe i'm just grasping at strews to verbalize feeling so sad and heavy