I used to hate having a summer birthday as a kid.
Sure, pool parties were an option and school didn’t get in the way of celebrating, but as a kid you don’t talk to any of your school friends during summer unless they live in your neighborhood. At least, that’s how it was for me. But that was also during the ancient times of no cell phone and not a lot of time on the phone (I don’t think I’ve ever really liked talking on the phone).
But as I’ve gotten older, and into college, my July birthday has kind of been a wonderful thing. With a lot of my friends staying in my school’s town for the summer months, or with new friends so close for my birthdays (like last year at Disney and this year during my Study Abroad), the possibilities have always been wonderful.
This birthday might have been the cream of the crop, though. That’s a lot coming from a girl who has been planning her birthday parties since she was four and never repeating an activity/theme.
London has been kind to me in the weeks leading up to my birthday, but the study part of my study abroad had been getting kind of heavy, which was kind of stressing me out. So, birthday celebrations came just in time.
Unfortunately, I don’t have a ton of pictures to show you just how wonderful it was because most of them are on my phone. And my phone was stolen. In Paris. But that’s the day after my happy birthday day. So, I’ll save that for another post.
My day began with a tour of Westminster Abbey with one of my wonderful friends in my program. It was a beautiful building with so much history in its walls. But I did walk in with this prejudice of nothing being able to beat the experience I had at Canterbury (it was incredible). So, that might have been a bit of a damper on what could have been an incredible experience.
But then the tour ended at Poets’ Corner.
I kind of flipped.
These were novelists and poets that I’ve been reading for so much of my life and studying academically for almost four years now. These were people who have inspired how I want my voice to be etched into history (through writing). They’ve sculpted my mind and my heart to see and feel things from perspectives that I wouldn’t have without them. I just wanted to sit there and take in and pour out all the gratitude I felt for these word artists that gave their all to their craft and did it so beautifully.
After that powerful experience, I made my way to the London Eye where another one of my lovely friends in my program met with me so we could see London from the Eye’s view. It was kind of awesome. I would definitely recommend it. I mean, I knew London was kind of massive just traveling around the Tube so much, but my mind highly underestimated just how big it actually is.
After the Eye, we had to rush back to our flat for two reasons. 1) The Tube Strike was set to start at 6:30 (it was nearly 6:00 when we were done with the Eye) and 2) I had to be back to get ready for Phantom of the Opera.
That’s right, ladies and gentlemen. I saw freaking Phantom of the Opera at Her Majesty’s Theatre on my 21st birthday. And it was beautiful. And I nearly cried. And I have none of my own pictures from it. But I do have wonderful friends who went with me and took pictures that I just happened to be in. So, that’s pretty great.
It was a fantastic birthday and I’m so grateful that I got to be in such a beautiful part of the world for it doing beautiful things with beautiful people that I have grown to love and care for in such a strangely short amount of time.
This birthday was one for the books.
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