happy birthday erica!

I love birthdays. I especially love my birthday, but other people's birthdays are so much fun. It's a whole day devoted to you.  It's the one day you get to be selfish and all about you without seeming stuck up or an attention hog.  It's great.  Today was my TL, Erica's, birthday.  Even though she graduated a year ahead of all of us and did City Year last year, she turned 23 today (only two months before me).
Our entire team is in love with Erica, so we all did a lot to make today a big deal.  We always circle up in the morning to talk about the day, so today Sam had wrapped up Catch Phrase and we all signed a card.  She was so excited about Catch Phrase since she had lost hers earlier this fall.  We had also put streamers all over the office, so it really felt like her birthday.
The day went by and we met at the end of the day to do our final circle.  I had made a Diet Coke cake (just cake mix + a can of diet coke = so good!) so before we started, I whipped it out.  It was delicious!  Then, Pat was like "is this really important or can I make a phone call?" and before Erica could respond, he was already on the phone.  Every time we had asked Erica about her birthday, her response was always "Yeah i guess I just don't see how I did anything. You should really be thanking my mom."   So who does Pat call?  You guessed it right.  He had taken Erica's phone earlier to get her mom's number, so he put her mom on speaker phone. She loved it and Erica was so confused. It was great.
I agree with Erica in a sense, but I think that birthdays are just a great way to celebrate a person. I think it's easy to get lost in the crowd and to make someone feel so special for a day is something so easy and great.  Erica has done so much for all of us these past couple of months. She's an incredible leader and friend and loves the kids of NHCS as if they are all her own.  She's an incredible person and role model and I am so lucky to heave her as our (fearless) leader.  Happy birthday Erica!

"How old would you be if you didn't know your age?"
-Satchel Page