The older I get, the more I think the ideal birthday isn’t a rager or a bucket-list trip but a day that feels like how you’d like the rest of your year to feel. A soft-focus “new year, new me,” without the punitive self-improvement vibes that January tends to summon.

This Tuesday was my birthday, and it was, somehow, exactly that. I woke up to iced coffee on the patio — in October, no less — and prepped for an interview with Cassandra Peterson, a.k.a. Elvira, about her new gothic entertaining book. (Her advice for reviving a dying party? “Get everyone naked.” Reader, I took notes.) Then my boyfriend and I dashed to a 2:15 lunch reservation at Le Bouchon, a French restaurant we talk about going to more often than we actually do.

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