HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME

BY DENISE “KARMA” CLIFFORD

As I sit here in my underwear drinking coffee on my birthday, and ask myself why I haven’t come up with a topic yet to write about, my phone rings. As I listen to one of my good friends sing to me I realize Just how great it is to be doing exactly what it is I am doing.

We talked for almost an hour and I expressed how I was just about to start my article, but had no subject matter. I felt like just winging it would bring thoughts to words and words to paper. She suggests I write about myself. I mean, that’s what I do anyway, but she added to utilize the whole scheme of the universe, and making choices for SELF, not being a people pleaser as once I was.

The universe is a funny thing, and it plays well with your thoughts when you toss them into the air like confetti. And I’ve been doing that my entire life. Coincidences may or may not be by chance, but it’s not by chance yet choice that I sit here surrounded by my 3 dogs admiring the icey rain out the window. Just a week ago I would have been cooking breakfast in town at a little place for someone else, but my role in the universe was to become sustainable here at home.

I tend to write and share about my roles in life and how the universe plays out, and it isn’t without prompting. I feel some things may happen when you’re ignoring your chance to manipulate your future. But most things are created at first with Just a glimmer of who you want to be. A joke said out loud, a dream in the wee hours of the night. All to be either forgotten about and swallowed up by the universe or used as a blueprint for your next move in the game of life. I was born today, not to be ordinary or let my dreams be swooped up and landing on someone else’s door step. And me, left sitting stagnant to complain about a life I wish I had, or why can’t do this or that. No, I was born to overcome obstacles, to defy people’s judgments, and to fail so I could succeed. I’ve done all of these things at one time or another.

I recently had a conversation with a complete stranger who at first made me second guess myself. I joined a friend out for happy hour, and the woman to my right looked over and said “aren’t you supposed to be cooking right now?” I laughed as I wondered who she even was and replied that I did that already today. She went on to express her concern for all the changes I seem to make. Weren’t you the food truck girl? Didn’t you manage that place on the bay? Don’t you write a column? Didn’t you play roller derby? Aren’t you trying to open a dog business? All of which was yes. But who was this lady who knew so much about me? I’m still not sure, but living back in my small hometown it isn’t shocking when your life is subject to be talked about as if it’s some sort of comedy.

Just go back and read my past articles. I’m not shy about my misgivings, or hardships, nor about the glorious goals I’ve crushed. I put my thoughts out there and then like the hurdles on the high school track that I used to scale, I do the same in life. At first I second guess myself, but as soon as the shot goes off and I take that first step, all I see is the first hurdle. I don’t think about the next ones, not until I know I made it over the first one. And then, before too long the race is over and I’ve jumped them all. Just like my life.

So, I went ahead and schooled her on my ideals of not being stagnant in life. I refuse to live life like a local on a barstool drinking the same drink, talking the same talk. Watching as the universe snatches my dreams to give to someone else, and wondering why. Needless to say, she ended up understanding that I read the choose your own adventure books and made that my life. She was the gun fire that snapped all the doubt, and I took off running.

I wasn’t born to sit still. Happy birthday to me. 2/23/23