Happy Birthday

January 30th, 2016

Tracy is- would have been- 58 years old.

Tracy and I loved to find ways to surprise each other for holidays and birthdays and he prided himself on finding creative over the top ways to outdo himself each time.

This always made me want to do a BETTER job at one upping him.

This year the grand boys asked if we were going to give Grampa a Birthday Party.

I thought that was a great idea.

My brother Stu was in Dallas for work and was thrilled to join our celebration that started on Friday night at Red Robin, one of Tracy's favorite junk food places to go eat when we moved here.

We all stuffed ourselves with ONION rings of course because who can think of Tracy enjoying food without thinking of him chomping away on ONIONS!  We followed that by eating burgers of every type and washing them down with a Gigantic ice creamy pie. This the boys devoured in a style reminiscent of watching a school of starving piranha enjoying a side of raw beef.

We waddled out of the restaurant after thanking Grampa for the excuse to pig out and told stories of how Tracy got to ring the bell on 2 different occasions at Ferrell's Ice Cream Parlor back in the 70's for eating an entire Trough of ice cream all by himself!!  If you made a pig of yourself you got your ice cream for free and they rang the bell and announced it to the whole place.  Everyone was SHOCKED that someone of his size could eat enough ice cream to feed an entire birthday party.

I took Stu back to his hotel and took off to Austin and got there about midnight.

I got up early and headed to San Antonio for the Hypnosis seminar whose focus was Past Lives hoping Tracy would show up to talk to me but I guess he was busy partying elsewhere.  I raced back to Austin in time to meet up with Rachel to head to the Grace Potter concert. Rachel surprised me by giving herself a makeover!!  New hair color, clothes and jewelry!  I almost didn't recognize her. Tracy would have loved that:)

We meet up with Nick and Paige and entourage at the Moody Theater to rock out with Grace Potter and the Nocturnals.  What a great time.  The guitar player  and the gal standing next to me ALSO were celebrating their birthdays too!!  

We stayed until they moved us outside and we headed back to Rachel's as Nick and Paige raced off to continue their night's celebration.  Since one of the closing numbers was a David Bowie song from the Labyrinth we just HAD to watch it when we got home.  

This morning, Sunday started with a photo shoot so I have business head shots and then I headed him in time to catch a movie with the Sarah and Tim and boys to finish out Tracy's birthday celebration.

Tracy LOVED going to the movies and often left work with the excuse that they were rained out or "niced out" meaning it was just too nice to work that day and would spend that beautiful day INSIDE sneaking off to the movies with Jim.

We all loved Kung Fu Panda 3 and I am absolutely positive Tracy would have loved watching the boys watch the movie as well as laughing like a child himself at the slap stick humor of it. Dinner of chicken fingers and ranch dip with a popcorn chaser was a movie favorite menu for Tracy so I think it was a completely perfect evening.

Happy 58th Birthday Baby.

I purposely chose to be very busy and celebrate Tracy's birthday with every family member and I am so glad I did.  This was even more emotional than Thanksgiving or Christmas because there was no other reason to be together, no presents for others, nothing but to realize we would have to have enough fun for Tracy too since he isn't here.  

Knowing Tracy would have had a great time and would have been happy to have me with the kids made the weekend much better but it was still hard to know I will never get to shop for that special something and get to watch his surprised expression when I gave it to him.  My mind automatically skips ahead to the next holiday- Valentine's Day- ugh.... and now I see the pattern of dreading the FIRST of everything without him forming.

Luckily Tracy didn't care at all about Easter and thought I was ridiculous to try to come up with mailable Easter baskets and egg hunts for grown kids.  I will miss him laughing at the kids chocolate covered faces and hands and his cooking the BEST holiday meals and being so proud of himself for it.

I had a GREAT weekend and at the same time it was tough.  It's like living 2 lives.

I realize I can't live with a foot in the past constantly but I also have NO interest in pretending Tracy didn't exist. 

Every day is a new adventure and with all the love and support of my family and friends I feel like I am making my way to whatever my new life is.  Maybe that is my real gift to him.

Happy Birthday Tracy.