"What do you want for your birthday?”

A question that my husband always asks every year. And my response is always the same, a grin on my face and, "I don't know what I want for my birthday".

And that's no lie. It's not a "I actually want a diamond ring but you have to guess because I want you to surprise me" kind of response. I really never know what I want for my birthday. My husband somehow still tries to give me a present, every year for the past 6 years - and I must say he's done a great job each year too! (or maybe because I didn't expect to get anything - everything was a surprise!). And this year I know he is going to wreck his brain again. And yet I still gave him the same answer today when he asked me that.

Then, not long after he asked me that question, I knew why I never know what I want for my birthday. We were waiting for a movie to watch at Blitz Cafe in Grand Indonesia. This place is one of our favourite spots to chill out - we both like the music and the ambience. While waiting and sipping our drinks slowly, we were both reading (I know what some people may be thinking – we looked like autistic couple doing our own thing…haha…but that’s just the way we are, sometimes). At one point I lifted my eyes off the Agatha Christie's novel that I was reading - and saw outside the skyline was beginning to show the sunset colours. There was a nice music at the background - somehow it all gave me a very tranquil feeling.

I looked at my seriously reading husband, asked him of what he read, and he asked mine. And we began talking about things around us - we are building our little 'cocooning place' and we talked about getting some good ideas from that café.

Somehow I enjoyed that simple moment. At the background Louis Armstrong was singing 'Wonderful World', and I felt exactly that - wonderfully happy. There was nothing grand about the moment - just a simple, knick knack kind of conversation amidst the good books that we were both reading, but that's the kind of moment that I cherish. Nothing else is important - just us and our dreams, and how we connect well even when we were both having two different things in our hands: me with my Agatha Christie's novel, and Cip with his comic, and neither Cip nor I have ever read the book that each of us had in our hands that time.

Those kinds of simple things, which we cannot have everyday, are always enough for me. A moment for two. I am not particularly a romantic person - I just want a time where we can enjoy our connection while keeping our different interests. And though it is not everyday that we can have it, but I think we always have enough ‘dose’ of it from time to time.

So, why should I want anything for my birthday if I can always have the experience of being a couple without losing myself. And I guess, having my husband with me now, is more than enough than any gifts in the world.

Plus...I am sure he will surprise me again this year...hahaha....that's the beauty of not wanting anything for my birthday: I am always in for a surprise!!



Wonderful World

I see trees of green........ red roses too
I see em bloom..... for me and for you
And I think to myself.... what a wonderful world.

I see skies of blue..... clouds of white
Bright blessed days....dark sacred nights
And I think to myself .....what a wonderful world.

The colors of a rainbow.....so pretty ..in the sky
Are also on the faces.....of people ..going by
I see friends shaking hands.....sayin.. how do you do
Theyre really sayin......i love you.

I hear babies cry...... I watch them grow
Theyll learn much more.....than Ill never know
And I think to myself .....what a wonderful world

The colors of a rainbow.....so pretty ..in the sky
Are there on the faces.....of people ..going by
I see friends shaking hands.....sayin.. how do you do
Theyre really sayin...*spoken*(I ....love....you).

I hear babies cry...... I watch them grow
*spoken*(you know their gonna learn
A whole lot more than Ill never know)
And I think to myself .....what a wonderful world
Yes I think to myself .......what a wonderful world.

(RIRI)