The Big Five-Oh

 I have a lot to say about the philosophical implications of turning fifty, but that discussion would take far more than fifteen minutes. For now I'll content myself with simply sharing a little bit about the big day itself.

Looking back, the first thing I notice is a major failure in the picture taking department. It was a big, busy day and I have almost no photographic evidence. Sad.

The first, best part of the day was going to the airport and collecting Anna! She's home from the University of New Mexico for spring break. And my birthday, of course. :-)

My grand dreams of celebrating this birthday with a Caribbean cruise were abandoned years ago. So were most lesser celebration dreams. But with the whole family together, even doing the weekly shopping trips and SportClips run counted as a celebration of sorts.

And of course, no Don birthday would be complete without pizza. Minsky's Pizza is a local pizza chain that has both gluten- and dairy-free options, so we were able to order pizzas that everyone in the family could eat.

Sure, we could have fed the family a steak dinner for what we paid, but it wouldn't have been pizza, so what's the point of that?

Sadly, again there were no pictures. But trust me, it was delicious.

I think it's going to take a while for me to decide how I feel about being fifty. But my family did a great job at making sure that turning fifty was an experience to be cherished.