Happy Birthday, Lynn!

I feel extraordinarily lucky to have you as a lifelong friend.

On your birthday, I am celebrating not only my good fortune in being married to you, but much more -- I am celebrating all the things I admire, respect and desire in you.

You are such an intensely loyal friend. Your ability to live toward people as a "finisher" is a trait that only a few lucky people in the world have experienced. Because you're such a Good Friend -- you're the kind of friend that invests deeply, for the long haul, and whole-heartedly in your friendships. Those of us who happen to be the lucky few to whom you have committed, are wealthy because of the love, attention, listening, empathy, care, time and laughter you give to us.

You are such a gifted professional. I feel like you have cultivated the notion of VOCATION in an a way that is deeper, richer and more full than most human beings I know. Profoundly aware of both your abilities and your limitations, you leverage your best efforts toward the work that is before you (regardless of how honorable, exciting or surprising that work is) and as a result - the fruit of your labor is always more honorable, exciting and surprising than any of your colleagues could have expected. The affirmations of your professionalism continue to build in volume and bandwidth the longer we stay in a place, and it feels good to be located so close to you as the reverberations of your gifts echo throughout the space where we live.

You are an intuitive and caring mother. The way that you profess your love to your kids, touch and cuddle them, carefully mentor their learning process, balance the thousands of prescriptions, appointments and transportation routines that define contemporary parenting -- the way you balance the beauty of affection and the responsibility of the mundane -- both inspires and invites me (toward better parenting).

You are fun. I know that you fear that the routines and responsibilities of middle age will extinguish the spark of life, creativity, excitement and newness that you have always relished and embraced with your friendships, your traveling, your conversations & your ambition. You continue to pursue Life! Newness! Surprise! and Change! in ways that I could never expect or predict. When you tell funny stories, you completely embody this trait that you have -- of being fully committed, totally in the moment, raptured by humour, and hopeful of sharing connection.

I am rich because I know you. Happy Birthday!