24

I, historically, hate my birthday. The past 2 years haven't been bad - as in, nothing traumatic has happened like being accused of being a terrorist before boarding a trans Atlantic flight, or having a "fuck you" party thrown in my honor, or not being invited on a family vacation in honor of my brothers birthday which is three days before mine - but after two decades of build up, the anxiety surrounding my birthday is high.

So the past two years I essentially sank into corners, hummed loudly and waited for the day to be over. If nothing happened, I reasoned, nothing bad can happen.

I've got a better take on things after this year.

Ok, so que the anxiety in the form of irritable bowl syndrome on Friday night. Couldn't sleep. Hurt. Hurt. Hurt. Holy crap I need to take a holy crap but I cant and it hurts hurts hurts. For the next two days. Until Sunday night, just an hour or so before Jeff and I are supposed to leave on my birthday trip when...oh my god...I need depends or we're not going on this trip after all.

So we leave Charleston really late on Sunday night to drive a few hours to Asheville, NC. We check into our hotel room and head on up to our room ready to pass out...we walk in and...well...thats a living room? And is that a...yep, that's a separate room where our giant bed is. This is not the room we ordered. I hope this isn't the room we paid for. I call down to the front office and the guy tells me that the room we booked was over booked and since we were so late checking in, they filled up all the standard kings and had to upgrade us! Sweet! and also Suite!! Ok, fine, it was the Holiday Inn...but it was a brand new Holiday Inn, only a few months old, so it didn't have that dirty hotel feeling and still...Suite! Balcony! Two flat screen TV's!

Monday was my birthday and we went to the Biltmore which was awesome. Marching around the largest house in America with an audio tour plugged into my ears is honestly a great time to me. Houses! The grandness! I must come back at Christmas! (my favorite holiday with an anxiety rating of -63) Oh look! There is a winery here, too! Free tastings! Lets go!!!!

So yes, keeping busy doing something fun with my man, far away from anyone else that I know was a huge help. That, and leaving my cell phone in the hotel room so I wasn't thinking about who wasn't calling me to wish me a happy birthday. (yes, of course I'm aware I bring this on myself).

No one knew it was my birthday at the Biltmore which meant I didn't expect anything from anyone except to serve me lots of free wine samples...and they did.

On ward and upward, Tuesday we went white water rafting which was a blast and then had dinner down town and more importantly had desert at this place - French broad Chocolate Lounge. Between the Biltmore and the Chocolate Lounge I have been dreaming of wine and chocolate for a week now. Good wine and good chocolate.

Downtown Asheville is charming, adorable, the food is amazing. The fuckin' hipsters are vast and its hard to tell where the hipsters end and the homeless people start - but it was a cool place to visit. I'll go back for sure...at Christmas time. I wonder if fuckin' hipsters decorate their turtle shelled glasses and scarfs with tinsel and lights. I guess I'll find out!

Came home Wednesday night and Thursday night went to my friends Lauren and Ricky's for family dinner. This is something we do every week...pot luck style dinner, usually about 6 of us, some booze, good times. Except this time they told me not to bring anything.

They shoved me in a car and took me to one of the nicest restaurants in Charleston (which is really saying something because there are A LOT of really nice restaurants in Charleston). Oak Steakhouse, and 3 story restaurant in the heart of downtown where all of the servers are wearing ties and cummerbunds and each table has two assistant waiters wearing bow ties and vests.

Oh, and when dinner was over and our plates were cleared, a piece of cheesecake covered in fresh strawberries and blueberries (my favorite) was brought to us lit with a candle and, written in chocolate across the plate, it read "Happy Birthday Sarah".

This, of course, was only a surprise to me - but then our server showed up with six glasses of pink champagne. My friend Chirstina proclaimed "wait...I don't remember saying anything about this!" and we toasted my birthday and all was grand.

I can't wait to turn 25.

Oh wait. 25 sounds like an adult. Maybe I can wait a year or so.