In the wee hours of this morning, a personal anniversary came and went even as I slept, a marker in time which serves to remind me how often I’ve journeyed around the sun. Today I turned 37.

Birthdays represent something different to everyone, and in that sense I am no different than anyone else. Unlike so many others, however, my leap from one year to the next measured on the date of my birth seldom means wild celebrations fogged with mind-altering accoutrements.

Instead, more humble observances tend to be my style, more reflective remembrances of where I’ve been and where I’m going, not to mention where I am.

So too will it be this year.

Even as this day approached, I found myself contemplating not just its relevance and meaning—as if birthdays must have implications beyond growing older—but I also found myself lost in memories dating back more than a decade. What do I mean?

While putting together my life list, I have lost myself in the reading of every post on this blog, not to mention every page of my offline journals, all in a quest to rediscover the many forms of life with which I’ve shared a blink of existence. In so doing, I became powerfully affected by the dichotomy of this birthday occurring little more than three months after the third anniversary of Derek’s death.

One a celebration of life ongoing. The other a celebration of life ended. What a dreadful truth to realize.

But what does it mean?

In honor of my own birthday today, I am beginning a new, infrequent serial entitled “First death, then what?”, a heartfelt journey through time and mind, a walk along a path which is sometimes dark, sometimes light, and always sincere.

Come along if you will, if you dare, for the road is not always an easy one to travel.