Today is my forty-first birthday.

I had aspirations of making it a slower day, but that didn’t really happen. I did, however, start my morning “on the Bench” for one of our development projects and that was pretty spectacular, especially with the weather we had. Today has to have been the nicest day of the year.

I very much enjoy my birthdays, but the cadence of them seems to only speed up. It feels like just last month that I turned forty. And so in many ways, birthdays are a reminder to me that it’s important to be decisive and not waste time. Life keeps moving forward whether we like it or not — usually quickly. So it’s best to optimize accordingly.

At the same time, this is probably one of my biggest faults. I’m bad at slowing down and living in the moment. I get restless. Neat B tells me that I am at my most relaxed when we are traveling in Paris and just sitting idly in a cafe somewhere. That sounds right. But I’d like to do more of this at home.

So that’s my birthday wish (goal) for this year.

Today is my fortieth birthday. And despite a noble attempt to avoid having meetings today, I spent a big chunk of the day in them. Thankfully, I was also fortunate to spend a lot of time with family, friends, and colleagues (see evidence above).

This is a birthday where I think I'm supposed to feel things. And I do. I'm grateful for the wonderful people that I get to have in my life and who love me. I feel lucky that I get to wake up every day and do something I love. And I'm genuinely excited for this next decade.

It is, however, true that time does speed up. It feels like just yesterday that I was 30 years old. I had just finished my MBA. I was about to start writing this daily blog (yes it's nearly a decade old). And I was trying to figure out how to make an impact on the world.

Maybe not much has changed. It's not in my nature to feel complacent. But there is something nice about getting older and feeling more confident with yourself and your abilities.

If anything, birthdays are a good reminder that time is precious. We only have so many weeks. So we shouldn't feel shy about asking the world for what we want. I think that's what I'm feeling most this birthday, and I view that as an exciting thing. So here's to forty years.

Neat B and I had a very good friend's 40th birthday dinner in the Junction this evening.

So naturally, we walked over to the UP Express station from our offices in the Financial District and took the train one stop to Bloor Street. When we got off -- along with everyone else who uses our airport link as a regional express train -- we then walked the West Toronto Railpath up to the restaurant on Dupont Street. All in all, it took us about 35 minutes. We hopped on the 5:30PM train and we arrived at Lucia around 5:50PM.

I know that a lot of people use this particular train to get to and from work, but I'm always so happy whenever I do it. I will take this over being stuck in traffic every day of the week. And for me, it is a powerful reminder of just how critical "two-way, all-day regional rail service" is to this urban region. We can talk all we want about better traffic signals, ramping up enforcement, or whatever, but the real solution to solving traffic congestion is getting people moving in other ways.

Anyway, I digress. Here's a photo of the delicious pasta we had:

Happy birthday Philip!