Birthday Festivities, Or How Great is Gabrielle?!, Or I’m Going to Keep Talking About How Wonderful Gabrielle Is Until Someone Tells Me to Stop

First off, I should say that I was sick. Kinda dying, kinda on my deathbed sick. I honestly felt like crap.

So sick that my boss—someone who told me on the day that I interviewed with him for my position that we “don’t take sick days here”—insisted that I stay home on my birthday, a Friday. This kinda ruined Gabrielle’s plans a bit.

First off, she was supposed to pick me up from work like she usually always does. Then, she told me later, she had planned to drive me directly from school, unbeknownst by me, my bags already packed, and take me away for a weekend away. It didn’t quite work out that way.

What did happen was that I was on the couch all day running a fever and with a deathbed cough watching endless hours of TV in my pajamas and/or underwear. I took naps. Curled up with the kitty. Was sang to by my mom and dad. And packed my bag for a trip that Gabrielle informed me only of the night before, when it was clear that I’d be too sick to go into work the next day. While in the car, Gabrielle told me that we were going to be going to Bodega Bay, the location used for the film, The Birds, and a place that this Hitchcock fan has actively wanted to visit since we moved out here in 2008. With that in mind, we drove the windy, twisty road in the dark to Occidental (something that seemed especially dark and eerie after learning that our weekend was to be all about Hitchcock) where we pulled up to small inn. Inside was a beautiful old canopied bed, bathroom, and a “living room section” with a couch and fireplace and chocolate birthday cake waiting for me.

I unwrapped my parents’ present, which had arrived in the mail earlier that week, fed me some medication, and we both went to bed.

That Saturday, Gabrielle gave me the option of hiking, zip lining, river rafting, or shopping around the cute towns (and had information on all of them printed out!). Given my condition, we decided that the latter would probably be the most appropriate. We had a wonderful day, with very very brief hiking at the state park, and a delicious, yet miserable dinner where I almost passed out in the middle of the restaurant and reminded myself that I was still really sick and probably should be in bed. We came back, I took more medication, and we both went to bed.

That Sunday, we filled the day with a ceder enzyme bath (think a mud bath, but with finely shredded [like dust!] fermenting wood chips) which was in the middle of a zen garden. It started with us undressing and picking out our kimonos, sitting in the garden and drinking tea infused with herbs to speed up our metabolism, and then climbing into the bath. (As someone who gets really overheated and restless easily, I actually much prefer this to a mud bath! You’re able to take out your legs and it feels a lot less heavy on your body.) Then, we showered off with water, then with a mist that naturally hydrates your skin, and were taken into a dark room with music playing, and were told to close our eyes for a half hour. Thirty minutes later, Gabrielle and I found ourselves waking up, and wrapped ourselves in the polar fleece hooded capes they offered, and spent some time in the drizzly zen garden. It was absolutely lovely.

Afterward I took a break with more medication, Gabrielle drove us to Bodega Bay and all around to the Hitchcock/The Birds sights. We visited the gas station, ate at the diner, took some ridiculous videos of me running by the old schoolhouse and the church, and visited several souvenir shops. 

Gabrielle’s the best, isn’t she?