Guerrilla Kindness (x post)

It's my "birthday season!" [addendum of 1/23/08: my birthday's not till 1/29, but I don't like to limit my celebrations to just one day. A few years back i decided to institute a birthday "season." This is also known as "milking it."]

For my birthday, I would love it if you kept in mind the following, which I often share with others on their birthdays:

"Celebrating a birthday is exalting life and being glad for it. On a birthday we do not say: Thanks for what you did, or said, or accomplished. No, we say: Thank you for being born and being among us. ... Celebrating a birthday reminds us of the goodness of life, and in this spirit we really need to celebrate people's birthdays every day, by showing gratitude, kindness, forgiveness, gentleness, and affection. These are ways of saying: It's good that you are alive; it's good that you are walking with me on this earth. Let's be glad and rejoice."

~ Henry J. M. Nouwen ~ (1)

Last year I wrote a pre-birthday blog full of gift hints (if you can call full-color photos with ordering info "hints") but this year I have a rather different request. Instead of a gift or act of kindness to me, I am requesting that my lovely friends & family do one of the following:

1. Commit a random act of kindness. You know what I'm talking about. Pay the toll for the guy behind you, put quarters in someone's parking meter. Help an old lady carry her groceries, shovel the neighbor's walk. Call someone you haven't talked to for a while and just tell them how much they mean to you. I could go on but I'm hopped up on enough Sudafed to immobilize a rhino, so if you want more ideas, please go here. Or here. The caveat is that you then have to tell ME what you did. Write it down, take pictures, record it somehow, and then send it to me at Miz Annie, P.O. Box 1344, Kennebunk, ME 04043. That would be the MOST AWESOME BIRTHDAY CARD EVER!
   
2. Dog food. Cat food. Kitty Litter. Paper towels. Monetary donations – not to me, but to your local animal shelter. Local peeps, Animal Welfare Society in Kennebunk. is one of the local shelters that worked extra hard to find the room and resources to take care of the hundreds of animals rescued in that heinous Buxton puppy mill seizure. (the Animal Refuge League of Greater Portland is another – they can use supplies and money too!). OR just show a little love to YOUR local shelter. OR offer to take the neighbor's dog for a long walk, or a run on the beach. You all know how much joy the animals bring to my life, so knowing you were sending some extra love back out to the animals would be the MOST AWESOME BIRTHDAY PRESENT EVER!

You know, every year I thank my Mom for not stopping at five kids (I'm the youngest of six). Because if she had, I wouldn't be here to enjoy this big, messy, sad and beautiful world(2) that we're all sharing and calling home this time around. And I would never have known all of you. So, happy birthday to me, the luckiest girl in the world! Now send some love out to the world I dig so much.

here i am shortly after my arrival here from the home planet. my mom
wrote the caption, which refers to the camp we rented at Square Pond
every summer but as it turns out,"here" means HERE.

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(1) Who the heck is this Henry J.M. Nouwen guy, and why does she keep quoting him, yo? Well, he was a great guy and you would really like him. He was super-duper religious and "organized religion" is not something that turns me on, but Nouwen was so great at teaching a "theology of the heart" and being a synthesizer of diverse theologies and incorporating metaphysics into the teachings of the church that I can overlook that .... no, actually, i can admire him because he had the guts to inject the old gal with a good dose of mysticism.

(2.) Yes, I stole that from "Down by Law." So sue me. I thought it would be nice for Tom Waits and Henry J. M. Nouwen to share space in the same blog. ;-)