The thing about turning forty-three is that no one cares. It’s not a milestone in any way beyond “You made it 43 years.” Is it the last year of your early forties or the first year of your mid forties? No one knows. No one really cares.

I don’t say that in a woe-is-me, people-should-pay-attention-to-me sort of way. I say it because it is true regardless of how anyone feels about it. I’m not upset that no one cares that I’m turning forty-three. I have friends and family who care about my birthday and who will celebrate it with me. It’s just not an exciting birthday.

But I decided that it kind of stupid to look at my age and think, “There’s nothing notable about this year” and just leave it at that. So I decided to make it as exciting a year as I can…considering I work a regular 8:30am-5:00pm office job and am mom to a three-year-old with an endless supply of energy. Not saying I’m going to make this year “my year,” or some other trite statement, but rather than go down the road of existential dread and midlife crises, I’ll do something positive with that energy.

~*~

So who am I?

My name is Amadei. I was born at 4:00am on February 24, 1982. The things I know about that day (and slightly before):

• My mom was hanging the curtains in her bedroom when her water broke. Those curtains hung in that room for somewhere around fifteen years.
• The nurses at the hospital didn’t believe she was in labor so she spent most of her labor in a regular hospital room attempting to convince her that all she was experiencing were Braxton-Hicks contractions. In the wee hours of the morning, a nurse asked her how she was doing and she said in the most sarcastic voice she could muster, “Well, with that last ‘contraction,’ I felt like I wanted to push.” All hell broke loose and I was born an hour later.
• In his excitement, my dad missed the turn to the hospital when coming to see me for the first time.

~*~

Currently, I live in Georgia with my husband, daughter, and two dogs. I work at a law firm. I enjoy reading (a lot), yoga (not as often as I should), knitting, cross stitch, crossword puzzles, playing video games, and the Oxford comma.

I don’t believe in tarot card readings, but I kinda want to.

My toxic trait is that I consume too much true crime. My husband thinks that maybe this means he should be careful because I know how to hide a body. I’m more inclined to feel like I know enough to know I’d get caught were I to commit any crime. My favorite podcasts are Last Podcast on the Left, Behind the Bastards, and Knowledge Fight.

I make no apologies for all the bad things I’d like to happen to Alex Jones.

If I could turn into any animal, it would be an otter. If I could have any superpower, it would be telepathy (but only if I can turn it off). If I were a genre of music, I want to say that I’d be punk rock, but if we’re being honest, I’m folk rock at best and country at worst. If I could have dinner with any two people, dead or alive, it would be Margaret Atwood and Oscar Wilde mostly because I want to listen to them talk. If I could master any skill immediately, I would learn to play the piano so whenever I was feeling a way, I could sit down and play it out.

I know a little bit about a lot of things, so let’s begin.