Define "Home Invasion"

Today is my 28th birthday. Yesterday Mitch took me to the Hopewell Rocks (one of my favourite New Brunswick places) to have a picnic and celebrate.

On the way back, we spotted a funky pottery studio that we wanted to stop into. "It kind of looks like her house," Mitch said. I thought the house probably was attached to the studio. I rang the doorbell and walked in. "Hello?"

It was dark in the front part of the studio, so Mitch turned the light on. At which point a twelve year old girl came around the corner looking very confused, and we started to figure out we had just invaded someone's home. "Oh, hi, we just wanted to look around." She kind of scuttled away and her mother came back. Oops. The studio wasn't actually open, but she was very welcoming to us. She even gave us a mini-tour of her house and the studio (which awakened the green-eyed monster in me!), expounding the merits of passive solar design, open lofts, and vibrant colour schemes drawn from her recent trips to France and Italy.

The best part of the visit? A quote she had jotted on a whiteboard above her workspace: We are all guardians of our own passions. There's some food for thought. Or maybe gum for thought. I'd like to spend a long time digesting that one.

If it isn't your birthday today, a very merry unbirthday to you!