Celebrating 40

I just turned forty.  Last year I went for a 39km hike through the Marin Headlands, north of San Francisco, to celebrate my 39 years.  By the time I got home I'd decided that I might be brave enough to do 40 miles this year and had already started imagining a route.  And then Qatar happened.  I tried, in vain, to find 40 miles or even kilometers that I would want to cover in Qatar.  I looked into doing it on a camel but the price made it impossible.  I tried and failed to think of some one thing I would want to do here that would be fitting to celebrate my birthday, an event that is (though it shouldn't be)  fraught.  I felt so frustrated to be squandering an opportunity to both celebrate and distract me from the so-called significance of forty, which has something to do with mid-life and all I should have accomplished by now and things on which I have now missed out forever. 

Finally, with days to spare, I realized that arranging one monumental, acceptably celebratory event was not just impossible but also not really necessary, that it might be just as good to try to find 40 small ones.  I started a list as I cooked dinner one night and easily made it to 30 before deciding to leave 10 that would surely appear as surprises.  

I celebrated with these forty small pleasures over two days, some with a friend, some with family, and some on my own.  I didn't get to the whole list exactly as I'd expected but I surely had at least 40, many of which could only have occurred in this land where I'm starting to feel more and more at home.  Here they are, in loosely chronological order:

1. Mini road trip to singing sands and beach with a good friend, many laughs at ourselves and at the world, the expedition also included

2.this dune,

 3. and when I went leaping down it,

4. also this beetle,

5. and these lizard tracks.

6. We spotted a large herd of large goats by a busy road, moving with purpose, as we drove by on our way

7. to a perfect picnic on the beach.

8. If I counted all the shades of blue between this beach and that sky I would use up most of my 40 at once...

9. We were thigh-deep in the Arabian Sea, checking out this rubbery thing,

10. while a silvery school of needle-sized fish was deftly avoiding our giant scary selves. 

11. Zooming on scooters through early bright full-of-promise morning to the mall with my son,

12. and then that moment when the scooter passed from the rattly bricks to the silent glassy mall floor and we kept on going(on alert for those killjoy security guards).


13. We helped the moon whistle Happy Birthday to me under the echo-y dome at the mall

14. and then shared donuts,

15. before scooting FAST down ramps by the aquatic center (no guards here either).

16. What could be sweeter than these two camels? I cannot imagine.

17. I lingered through the entire Mona Hatoum exhibition at Mathaf Arab Museum of Modern Art. (http://www.mathaf.org.qa/en/exhibitions-list/170-mona-hatoum-turbulence)

18. in particular the pieces in the first room, entitled Daybed, Paravent, and La Grande Broyeuse:

19. also this one,  + and -,  (though it's better you go see the whole show for yourself):

20. Snack at the MIA cafe, with the blue water and view of the West Bay skyline just on the other side of the window.

21. Lesson planning.  Really? Yes. A,  I had that view (#20) and B, planning a lesson that includes Maiasaura Peeblesorum and cowboy poetry was SO fun.

22. Roundabouts.  Really?  Yes.  Nothing like feeling like you've mastered something you were previously scared of.

23. I do love a harbor view.

24. This horse moment:

25. and the Ugandan security guard who commiserated when the horse across the aisle tried to chomp me but insisted I get a picture with the friendly one.

26. This view of a demolition site- sad and exciting- so precarious, so final.

27. This storefront, especially the loofahs and the dried chickpeas (with their little faces) and the toilet plungers:

28. More camels, willing to disturb their siesta only enough to briefly turn their heads and bat their eyes at me.

29. Comforting a sad puppy at the animal souq,

30. and minutes later watching a man carrying an aquarium with a bag of goldfish inside, trailed by a woman and then three little girls, and knowing how important and draining that expedition was.

31. This card,

32. this card,

33. this card,

34. and this card.

35. That for lunch there were so many delicious things on the menu that I didn't have to choose this- and probably never will:

36. Abundant love and good wishes from new and old friends around the world, via Facebook.

37. Mango juice on the bottom, Avocado on the top:

38. Driving up over the curb to get around a confused car, Doha-style.

39. Korean food.

40. Closing the day by sharing cake with my kids, my husband, and my parents, who had only arrived the night before, and without whom I would not have 40 years to celebrate.