Super Bowl or a Bowl of Soup?

why I'm celebrating today

Hi there,

Happy Super Bowl Sunday to those who celebrate!

I, for one, celebrate by explicitly not watching either the halftime show or the football games supposedly happening before and after it—instead opting for a super bowl of pasta, or perhaps a super bowl of biryani, possibly followed by a super bowl of ice cream.

And this year, I am more-actively-than-usual celebrating Super Bowl Sunday because it happens to fall on my birthday: a fantastic excuse for me to inadvertently go even bigger with the super bowl celebratory metaphor (stay tuned below). "Bowl" itself is a strange word—among a collection of terms that the more I stare at I am convinced its correct pronunciation doesn’t exist—but I digress.

FYI: Super Bowl Sundays are a great time to go to a restaurant without reservations or enduring the extra-ness of big crowds. Once as a kid, on another Super Bowl around my birthday, my family and I experienced great satisfaction from simply walking into the Jekyll and Hyde Club—the erstwhile wildly popular institution of the 1990s-early 00s—and getting a table without a reservation or so much as a fuss. Jekyll and Hyde was all the rage: several floors of prime midtown Manhattan real-estate, a dark and dimly lit vibe, haunted-house decor, and actors coming up to you while you dined. Speaking of which, I have no memory whatsoever of the food. What sticks with me most was that, thanks to the rest of the country watching football, we got to celebrate my birthday at one of the hottest spots in town.

I've always loved birthdays, and I’ve always loved getting older, both when I was a kid and now as an adult....which apparently I am now and have been for a while. I'm fortunate that my love and excitement for birthdays comes from how special my parents and extended family made them for me when I was growing up—all the way through until today...until a couple of hours ago, in fact. Early on, they instilled in me the important value that I’m very much worth celebrating.

As I wrote in a letter here last month, I consider the period between January 1 and now as one where my new year is still slowly unfolding....and February 9 just always feels like a natural time for things to “get started.” My birthday is also always around or on the Lunar New Year, making it feel even more so like a time for new beginnings, just as solar returns should also naturally be. Besides, the calendar year is only about 90% underway.

Age is just a number, sure, but it keeps increasing, and rightly so! In a video message today from my cousin Aisha and her young daughter, the latter noted her own age to the camera phone, which is 3. Aisha told her that I too am now 3...plus another number.

So now that I am happily 3 plus another number, this Super Bowl Sunday, I celebrate: with a super bowl of Peruvian paella...possibly the most super-sized bowl of dinner I've ever ordered in my life!

A super bowl of black seafood paella from Surfish Bistro…much of which is now in a to-go container in my fridge

Have a wonderful week, and until soon,

Insia