The Cake Was Worth It

January eighteenth. I want to be transparent about the state I was in last night: I had gotten approximately four hours of sleep, I was wearing jeans that required a decision, and at some point I ordered two appetizers without registering that I had already ordered one.

It was Simone's birthday dinner. Just the two of us at a small place a few blocks from the community center, the kind of restaurant where the candles are different heights on every table and the ambient noise requires you to lean in a little to hear. I have been to that restaurant maybe three times in the past year, and every time I leave thinking I should go back sooner, and then I don't, and then I do, and it's still right.

I have been thinking lately about what tired looks like when it's a good tired. The outdoor bouldering Saturday, the climbing sessions, the Wednesday class, my body has been doing things and it knows it has been doing things, and last night I sat across from Simone at a restaurant table and felt the very specific weight of having actually shown up for a week. Which is not a complaint. It is maybe the opposite of a complaint.

Tired eyes, full heart, two appetizers accidentally ordered.

She blew out the candle stub on her cake slice and said something I couldn't quite hear over the table next to us, and I laughed anyway because it was her birthday and the candlelight was good and I had already eaten more than I meant to. I got home, washed my face, looked at the windowsill, the collapsed bowl, the photographs, all five things in the January dark, and went to bed. Good tired is still tired. But I would do the whole evening over without changing a single appetizer.