They like me, they really like me!

Since Kevin Roderick was nice enough to highlight my birthday on LA Observed yesterday (thanks, Kevin!) I guess I should explain why I titled the last post the way I did. At first glance it probably gives the impression that I spent all of Sunday hungover the way I did the Sunday after I turned 26; while that is moderately true, it really has more to do with the fact that the fun I had on Saturday was tantamount to the fun I had at my 26th birthday party. Of course, had I not been hungover when I wrote the post, I might have realized that the party I was thinking of was actually for my 25th.

My 25th birthday was the last time I had a true, blown-out party. I actually shared the night with a friend whose birthday was close to mine, and between the two of us, we probably had 80 or 100 guests. It was the peak of our social lives in New York City, and in hindsight, I realize it was the last year we were all really, truly young. At 25, there were no commitments beyond Saturday night's party. No one was married, and kids were a dirty word. There weren't bridal showers to get up for the next morning, or marathons to train for at 9 AM. Drinking and socializing took precedence over any other responsibility, and we all got together every Saturday night to celebrate really nothing but our youth and the fact that we were all together.

By the time I turned 26, the bond most of my large group shared - college - seemed more distant and less relevant to our current lives. It's not that we drifted apart, exactly, but we made new groups of friends, and new sets of plans. People had started to advance in their careers, giving them money to spend weekends away. Relationships turned into engagements, kicking off an endless series of bachelor parties, spa weekends, and celebratory dinners in. Sometime during that one year, when none of us were looking, we all started to grow up. I never had a birthday like that again.

Until now.

I had been so worried about this birthday, about this party. I have been so lucky to have made so many good friends as I have in LA, but I was still worried that only a handful of people would show up. What can I say? It's LA. In addition to the usual commitments I mentioned above, people here can be kind of flaky; and, because the city is so damn big, you really can't blame someone if they don't feel like sitting in traffic for an hour just for a free drink.

But everyone showed up. And not only that, but everyone stayed. And had a good time. And really made me feel that I was among good - no, GREAT - friends. No one left early to go to another party. No one flaked because they didn't feel like going out after all. I had 25 people in my tiny apartment and they all came up to me and told me how nice my other friends were and how refreshing it was to go to a house party and not a bar. My first guests came at 8 PM; the last guests left at 2 AM. And the guests that left at 2 AM were the ones that drove the farthest - I had been pleasantly surprised and quite truthfully, thrilled, that they even came at all.

This party was even better, in some ways, than my 25th. I felt older, but in a good way. Because I wasn't throwing back the alcohol like I would have five years ago, I managed to have quality conversations with my guests. And remember them the next day. A few of my guests actually volunteered for responsibilities - one was in charge of making margaritas, another acted as photographer - so I could spend more time interacting with my friends. And as the last group left at 2 AM, they cleaned up nearly the whole apartment, so when I woke up, groggy on Sunday morning, there were no cupcakes sitting out gathering dust, no empty glasses crusting with sticky residue. I simpy had to throw out some bottles, wipe down some surfaces, and run the vacuum. It was the easiest after-party cleanup I've ever had, and has given me an example of how I would like to act the next time I attend such an event.

I know it's soon after, but I already see this party and this birthday as a watershed event in my life. It has already turned around how I feel about being 30, and it has also made me realize that I am so lucky to have what I have. One of the problems with being as ambitious as I am, as ADD as I can be sometimes, is that I am always looking ahead, looking for the next best thing, never quite satisfied with what is sitting right in my lap. As I was stressing over this birthday for the last month, I kept thinking about all the people back east - the people who have known me for so many years and wouldn't let me down on my birthday. How ironic that many of those were the exact people who forgot. I don't blame them. Those are the people who are married, have kids, have other commitments. The West Coast flakes, it turns out, were all I really needed.

And, as it turns out, that is just enough.